Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) skipper Virat Kohli has admitted that his dismal performance led to his team’s 97-run defeat against Kings XI Punjab in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) on Thursday.

Kohli first dropped two easy catches off his Punjab counterpart KL Rahul in the 17th and 18th over. The Indian maestro’s show with the bat also flopped severely as he scored just 1 during RCB’s chase.

“I think we were good in the middle phase with the ball, they got off to a decent start and we pulled things back nicely,” said Kohli on Star Sports after the match.

“I have to stand in front and take the brunt of it, not the best day in the office, couple of important chances of KL when he was set and that cost us 35-40 runs at a later stage maybe if we restricted them to 180 we wouldn’t have under pressure from ball one to chase. We know exactly where we went wrong and I have to put my hand up and say couple of important chances went down.”

Kohli came in at no.4, allowing Josh Philippe to take his no.3 spot. The tactic did not work with Philippe being dismissed for a duck and Kohli walking back on one run.

“He (Philippe) has batted at the top of the order for Western Australia and done well in the BBL as well, early days in the tournament so we thought we will maximise his ability and see how we go from thereon. We thought we will give ourselves a bit of depth in the middle overs,” said Kohli.

Kings XI Punjab skipper KL Rahul played a mammoth and unbeaten 69-ball innings of 132 runs to help his team thrash Royal Challengers Bangalore by 97 runs at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium.

Thanks to Rahul’s boisterous batting, Punjab posted 206/3 on the board. The Punjab bowlers continued the momentum their skipper had given and bundled out RCB for a paltry total of 109 in just 17 overs at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium.

Rahul, who crossed the 2000 runs mark in the IPL during his innings, hit 7 maximus and 14 boundaries at a strike rate of above 190. Among bowlers, leg-spinners Murugan Ashwin and Ravi Bishnoi were the stars as they took three wickets each.