It was the shot that liberated Royal Challengers Bengaluru.
When Rajat Patidar strode to the middle in the eleventh over, none of their batsmen — including Phil Salt who had just been dismissed — were in complete command. The heavy outfield was holding up the ball. The hard lengths CSK had hit were creating doubt. The run-rate spiked to 10 one moment and dropped to 8 the next. Nobody seemed to know what a par score was. When Patidar left at the end of the innings, RCB had scored 157 off 56 deliveries — mind-boggling carnage, with Devdutt Padikkal’s and Tim David’s knocks sandwiched in between.
He started it. After taking a single off the first ball he faced, Patidar fronted up to Noor Ahmad. Spin against Patidar is not a favourable match-up. He strikes at 170.30 against tweakers. Has hit more sixes off spin — 46 — than boundaries — 22. In the middle overs he goes at 174.23 against slow bowling, 44 of those 46 sixes coming in that phase. Not even Shreyas Iyer, prominent at No 4 and known as one of the best players of spin in the country, has numbers like that. Even Shivam Dube, who has made a living out of hitting spinners, only comes close.
Chennai should have known. Noor offered a bit of width. Patidar took a forward stride, flicked his wrists and sent it over covers. Two more sixes followed — off Dube and Matt Henry. The first a miscued hook, the second a swing through the line that cleared long-on. Three sixes off his first seven deliveries on a track where every batsman before him was fighting for timing.
Against the pacers he was no less — 165.12 in the middle overs. After Henry, two contrasting ones off Khaleel Ahmed. The first off a low full toss, Ahmed having missed the yorker by centimetres. The second over covers off the same channel. When the middle-over phase ended, Patidar had 40 off 14 at a strike-rate of 285.71.
#RCB dealing in 6️⃣s
🎥 Both Rajat Patidar and Devdutt Padikkal clear the rope to push the run rate above 9 📈
Updates ▶️ https://t.co/PkhPvxcU44#TATAIPL | #KhelBindaas | #RCBvCSK pic.twitter.com/zCe2QKN5Zx
— IndianPremierLeague (@IPL) April 5, 2026
The impetus Patidar provided meant David could take the game beyond CSK’s reach. Without Patidar, David’s innings may have been a non-starter. The match was tighter than the final margin suggested. One player changed its shape.
***
Plenty has been made about Shreyas Iyer and what he could offer an already strong India T20 squad. Patidar has been no less — and no less ignored. Like Shreyas, he has done the most difficult job in white-ball cricket: increasing the tempo in the middle overs against a variety of bowlers. Like Shreyas, he knows how to pace an innings rather than simply bat in top gear. The fact that he doesn’t bowl, and is 33, count against him. But Patidar is not a one-trick player, and the selectors have been slow to notice.
Story continues below this ad
In a franchise where the batting core is excellent, he has become the link between the top order and the lower order — the role RCB had been missing. He leads quietly, stays behind the scenes. In the middle, he lets his bat do it.
***
The numbers are one thing. The journey is another.
His mentor Amay Khurasia once reached for a line to explain the journey. “Kai baar pankh aur hausle dono hote hai magar udne ke liye aasman nahi hota.” Sometimes you have the wings and the courage but you don’t have the sky to fly. The sky has been slow in arriving.
When Dilip Vengsarkar watched a young Patidar in a domestic game and found him missing with a niggle, he told coach Chandrakant Pandit: “This guy should be playing for India. If I were the selector now, I would pick him.” Khurasia has another lament. “If he would have been playing for Delhi, Mumbai or Karnataka, he would have played at least 8-10 Tests by now.” The geography of Indian cricket’s attention has not always found Indore.
In 2022, Patidar wasn’t picked in the mega auction. He accepted it. He was playing division cricket in Indore when the replacement call came. He wasn’t sure he wanted to go. His marriage date was fixed. They won’t play me anyway, he told his friend Shubham Sharma. Sharma begged him. He went. He scored 333 runs in eight innings at 152.50. One of them was a 54-ball 112 in the eliminator against Lucknow Super Giants.
Story continues below this ad
What followed was an injury he had been managing in silence for four years — an achilles tendon, already fifty percent torn. The doctors told him: skip this IPL, have the surgery now, or play and be barely fit for the next one. He skipped. He came back completely.
The captaincy confirmation came one day before the press release. When Virat handed him the plaque, Patidar went blank. Virat said: “You deserve it. You earned it.” And Patidar became normal again.
Ram Atre, a coach in Indore, remembers Patidar getting out twice for zero at the MP trials and not being picked. No sign of sadness. Just — “Sir abhi aur mehnat karni hai.” The attitude never changed. “Sir apna kaam bas run banana hai.”
***
The India call did come — three Tests in 2024, after a solitary ODI the previous year. Something went amiss. Most of his dismissals were tame. Nerves, perhaps. The opportunity slipped.
Story continues below this ad
Sunday was another example of why it shouldn’t be the last one in white-ball cricket. Unassuming as ever. Decisive as always. The work continues.
