IPL 2025: Josh Hazlewood expresses confidence ahead of the clash vs PBKS

Once is commonplace, twice can be a coincidence, taking Rajat Patidar’s comments at face value. But to lose three games on the bounce at home is a trend, any which way one looks at it.

At the halfway point of the league phase of IPL 2025, Royal Challengers Bengaluru are the only team not to have won a game at their home base, the M Chinnaswamy Stadium. True, the venue hasn’t historically been their bastion like the Wankhede Stadium has been for Mumbai Indians or the MA Chidambaram Stadium for Chennai Super Kings, but even if they don’t vocalise it, Patidar’s outfit must be concerned at the lack of results in their backyard, in front of their passionate and loyal-to-a-fault supporters.

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Ex-factor bites again

The latest setback, on Friday night against Punjab Kings, was orchestrated by another former RCB star. If it was Mohammed Siraj who starred in Gujarat Titans’ eight-wicket win at the Chinnaswamy on April 2 and KL Rahul who masterminded Delhi Capitals’ six-wicket victory on April 10, ace leggie Yuzvendra Chahal was at it this time, with stunning figures of 2-11 from three overs in a match truncated to 14 overs a side due to a steady drizzle.

RCB did make a bold fist of trying to defend their anemic 95-9 — which owed itself entirely to Tim David’s maiden IPL half-century — through Australian pace ace Josh Hazlewood, until Nehal Wadhera played a blinder (33 not out, 19b, 3×4, 3×6) to shepherd Punjab to a five-wicket win with 11 balls to spare. Hazlewood, who dismissed rival skipper Shreyas Iyer and Josh Inglis in the space of three deliveries in his second over, ended up with excellent returns of 3-14, but that wasn’t enough to deliver his team a first home victory of the season.

‘Could’ve done better’

“We’ve done pretty well away from home,” Hazlewood said later, referring to the fact that RCB are four on four in away games. “It’s obviously three in a row now that we’ve lost at home. We’ve been a bit slow on the learnings from the first two games and didn’t put that into practice as well as we could have today, in particular in those first six to eight overs with the score the way it was.”

Put in on a sticky, tricky deck, RCB were 26-3 inside the Powerplay (four overs) and 42-7 after 8.2 overs before recovering to more than double their tally. “We’ll dive into this game when we get back to Bangalore [for the game against Rajasthan Royals next Thursday] and go through in detail and with a fine toothcomb and come up with a few ideas of where we can learn and improve. The bowling definitely improved from the last two outings; we’re slowly getting there, but probably not quick enough.” An honest assessment, if ever there was one.