Former Australia captain Aaron Finch has credited Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s (RCB) impressive IPL 2026 campaign so far to its fearless, aggressive batting philosophy and strong team culture, following their clinical win over Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) on April 15.
Chasing a modest target of 147 after a brilliant bowling and fielding effort, RCB chose not to take the conventional route of slowing things down. Instead, they maintained their attacking intent throughout the chase, keeping the net run rate in mind. Virat Kohli led the chase with a fluent 49-run knock, striking at 144.11. Skipper Rajat Patidar set the tone with a brisk 27 off 13 balls at a strike rate of 207, while Jitesh Sharma played a fearless 23 off just nine balls — his first double-digit score of the season. Finishers Tim David and Romario Shepherd then wrapped up the chase with unbeaten cameos.
“That’s just a batting unit with a lot of confidence. You can see the gap between the teams at the top of the table and the bottom. That was again evident today. They go with a similar structure on how they approach their run-chases. They go hard even when the game is in their grasp,” Finch told ESPNcricinfo.
“It would’ve been easy in that situation for one of their batters to get 25 not out, but no, that’s not how they play cricket in Bengaluru now. They continue to stick to their guns, they play to their strengths. If the match-up is theirs, they go for it. They put games to bed quite comfortably,” he added.
“The consequences of watchful batting when games are in control is that you lose credibility. If someone is prepared to just knock it around and look out for themselves, then next time they might do that too because they’re worried about next year’s contract. That’s how team cultures crumble so quickly. The fact that they went out and did what they talked about — brilliant,” he lauded the batting approach of each player.
RCB will take on Delhi Capitals (DC) next on April 18 in Bengaluru.
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