IPL: Our cricket tipster The Edge previews Friday’s IPL eliminator game between Rajasthan Royals v Royal Challengers Bangalore with a recommended BETDAQ bet.

MATCH OVERVIEW:

The IPL hits Ahmedabad on Friday for the final two Playoff games to decide the 2022 Champions. Rajasthan Royals and Royal Challengers Bangalore face off for a chance to meet Gujarat Titans in the Final on Sunday afternoon, and we’re sure to have another cracking game on BETDAQ Betting Exchange. As expected we had two very high scoring games in Kolkata, but now the dynamic might change as we move to the world’s largest cricket stadium in Ahmedabad.

Both sides have very strong batting units, and while their bowling isn’t fantastic – it does get the job done considering how much pressure their batters can put on the opposition. Lucknow Super Giants will feel unlucky not to have beaten RCB. They were well in range until things started to go wrong in the 17th over, and then the two wickets in the 18th over killed off any chance. It’s fair to say Rajat Patidar really stepped up under pressure for RCB with 112 runs off 54 balls – especially after Faf du Plessis was out first ball and then Maxwell only made 9 runs too. I asked the question how would RCB cope if du Plessis, Kohli and Maxwell didn’t get major runs – well Patidar answered that. I still feel the jury is out though because can RCB follow that up if the big three fail again?

For Rajasthan Royals, they would have been absolutely delighted to see their star man Jos Buttler score 89 runs off 56 in the first qualifier this week. There definitely was a worry about him heading into the Playoffs after such a strong start to the tournament his form fell down a little – well a lot! To have him in form is such a boost, and that gives the middle order the platform they need to fire. We should have a very close game here – once again you’d expect the bat to dominate the ball and the winner will be the side who can bowl better in my opinion. Both sides have very good batting line-ups.

WEATHER AND PITCH WATCH:

As I said with Kolkata this week, we can prepare well and look at the ground data, but we do have to judge the wicket when we see it. I fully expected high scoring games this week looking at the ground data from Kolkata, but you do have to remember there has been a big gap in cricket in India so conditions can change. At this ground, it’s only open a short time in the grand scheme of things so we don’t have much ground data here. We’ve seen more International cricket than IPL cricket. Before the IPL had to be postponed in India last year with a Covid19 outbreak, the average score batting first here was 159 from five games. We have saw some very different wickets here between the IPL and International games. Sometimes spinning square and looking impossible, sometimes looking very good for batting. The best advice here is to keep an open mind, and focus on looking for dew as if there is a heavy dew it will raise the scores.

RECOMMENDED BET:

It’s hard to see anything bar a very close game here. I am unsure of what conditions to expect, so I will be keep stakes small before the off. I expect the batters to come out on top just because both sides have a stronger batting line-up compared to the bowlers, but we could easily see conditions help the bowlers too. From a betting point of view, Rajasthan look the value at 2.06. I think we have the wrong favourites here – I know RCB are a market favourite, but Rajasthan have been the better team this season. As I said above, RCB don’t win often when their big stars fail. Yes, they got one this week when it mattered but it hasn’t happened often over the last few years. Rajasthan have a more solid look to them, and Buttler coming back into form is obviously a huge positive. I’d have them as the slight favourites over RCB.

The Edge Says:
Two points win Rajasthan Royals to beat Royal Challengers Bangalore at 2.06 with BETDAQ Exchange.

View the market here -> https://betdaq.biz/RajRcb

IN-RUNNING STRATEGY:

There could be some nice angles here, but we need to see what conditions are like before committing to a strategy. I don’t see a massive edge for the batting or bowling side here in the first innings, but given that we could see dew I would suggest bowling first could be the best option. As I said above, we’ve had a range of scores here since the stadium opened, so I wouldn’t go into this game expecting a big score. That being said, I do expect the batters to be on top just because they look better than the bowlers on both sides, so I wouldn’t spend too long on either bowling side unless conditions look very favourable. I would be keen to take on Kohli for RCB – he’s had a few decent innings but overall his tournament has been poor and he’ll be worth plenty of ticks. For Rajasthan, I’m definitely supporting Jos Buttler after the way he looked this week and he should enjoy the RCB bowling too.