Gaikwad: "A tough day in the field really hurt us."

It was Chennai Super Kings' heaviest defeat by a runs margin at their home ground, the MA Chidambaram Stadium, ending their eight-match winning streak against southern rivals Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB). CSK never truly recovered after falling to 26 for 3 in their chase of 197, and their captain Ruturaj Gaikwad felt that they shouldn't have been chasing such a large total in the first place.

At the post-match presentation, Gaikwad suggested that a target of 170 would have been more appropriate for the pitch, which he described as "sticky."

"To be honest, I still feel 170 was a par score on this wicket," Gaikwad said. "It wasn't that easy to bat on, but probably a bad day in the field cost us really badly. When you're chasing 170, you can approach the innings with a bit more time, but chasing an extra 20 runs on a wicket that gets sticky and stops after the ball gets old, you have to adjust your batting accordingly, especially in the powerplay."

RCB captain Rajat Patidar was the main beneficiary of CSK's fielding mistakes. Deepak Hooda and Rahul Tripathi both dropped him in the 12th and 13th overs, when he was on 17 and 19, respectively. Later in the same over, Khaleel Ahmed dived at short third but couldn’t quite reach an edge from Patidar, who was on 20 at the time. Patidar went on to top-score with 51 off 32 balls. Gaikwad felt that the dropped catches prevented CSK's spin trio—Noor Ahmad, R. Ashwin, and Ravindra Jadeja—from exerting pressure on the incoming batters.

"Definitely a different scenario when you have three world-class spinners in your team," Gaikwad explained. "You want new batters to face them, and that’s where the game can change. That’s what happened in the last game, but it didn’t happen this time. We dropped crucial catches, and they kept getting boundaries, which maintained the momentum."

CSK lost both Tripathi and Gaikwad early in their chase while attempting to take on the short ball, despite Josh Hazlewood's steep bounce. Gaikwad admitted that the large target forced the batters to take more risks than usual.

"We know Rahul backs his shots, and I went for mine too. Sometimes it works, sometimes it doesn’t. But when you're chasing an extra 20 runs, you tend to take more chances to stay ahead in the game. It didn’t work out, but I'm still happy we didn’t lose by a huge margin. At the end, it was just 50 runs."

Gaikwad's comment on CSK's biggest home defeat in those terms suggested he was trying not to overreact to the loss. He acknowledged that such results are bound to happen over the course of a long tournament like the IPL.

"We just have to turn up mentally and focus on the areas we can improve," Gaikwad said when asked about CSK's approach with the quick turnaround between matches, as they will face Rajasthan Royals in Guwahati on Sunday. "You're going to have off days in batting and bowling during a tournament like the IPL, but our fielding definitely needs to improve. We’ll come back stronger in that department."

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