Vettori rues batting flop in the death overs

Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper Daniel Vettori has said that his team fell short by 50 to 60 runs despite Chris Gayle (71) and Virat Kohli (45) putting on 118-run second wicket stand together and laying a solid platform against Kings XI Punjab in the IPL match on Wednesday.

"We lost momentum in the last five overs of our innings. The way they (Kings XI Punjab) bowled demoralised us and we could not score 50 or 60 runs in the slog overs," Vettori said.

Vettori said the team wasted the advantage that Gayle and Kohli provided by taking the Royal Challengers to 122 for one by 15th over on a pitch that was assisting the bowlers initially.

"RCB could have done better by setting 180-run target for the visitors to chase. It was difficult batting first up as the ball was doing a bit initially. Praveen Kumar bowled exceptionally well in his four overs, giving away just eight runs," he said.

The New Zealander also said that the Royal Challengers have reached a stage where they couldn't afford to lose another match.

"We don't want to lose our next two games against Deccan Chargers and Pune Warriors. Losing those will take us to a point of no return. We want to do things we did in the last couple of overs of the Kings XI's innings (effecting three run outs)," he said.