IPL 2021: Aakash Chopra questions Eoin Morgan's tactics against Royal Challengers Bangalore

Aakash Chopra, while reviewing the match between Kolkata Knight Riders and Royal Challengers Bangalore, in a video shared on his YouTube channel, raised several questions on the tactics of the KKR leader Eoin Morgan.

After Virat Kohli, the RCB skipper, won the toss and opted to bat, KKR was on the front foot as their mystery spinner, Varun Chakravarthy got rid of both Kohli and Rajat Patidar in the second over. However, much to everyone’s surprise, Morgan took him off the attack and brought him back in the 8th over when Glenn Maxwell and Devdutt Padikkal were well set.

Chopra even questioned Morgan’s decision of giving the ball to Harbhajan Singh, the off-spinner, in the 19th over against the likes of Ab de Villiers and Kyle Jamieson. The veteran spinner was taken for 18 runs by the duo.

He did a surprising thing: Aakash Chopra

“It is said that once you have a wrestler on the mat, you can either give him the chance to get up or crush him. Morgan said he will extend the match; he stopped Varun Chakravarthy after taking two wickets, and when an in-form Maxwell had come to the crease, where you will want a bigger contest at the start,” said Chopra.

“And then he did another surprising thing. He got Harbhajan Singh to bowl the 19th over. Who gives the 19th over to an off-spinner when AB de Villiers and Kyle Jamieson are batting, it means two right-handers. I agree his calculation might have gone slightly wrong, but Shakib’s over was remaining. You could have got a left-arm spinner who takes the ball away,” he added.

Speaking further about the need of sending Andre Russell up the order, Chopra said “What was the only way you could have won the match? You could have got out for 150, but the only way to win was to give Russell 40-odd balls to face. If he had come around the 9th over, he could have won them the match, otherwise, the loss was anyway confirmed because 200 runs couldn’t have been chased on that pitch.”

“So Morgan’s captaincy was really below-par. Gautam [Gambhir] said if he had been an Indian captain, the Indian media would have torn his clothes. Just because he is an overseas captain, no one is talking about it, but it should be done because the captaincy was very ordinary,” he concluded.