Gujarat Titans have started IPL 2026 with back-to-back defeats, Saturday’s six-run loss to Rajasthan Royals in Ahmedabad exposing two familiar issues: loose bowling lines and a shortage of sixes.
GT sent down nine wides, RR only three – a six-run gift that ultimately mirrored the final margin. “I felt like a lot of our bowlers were just a little bit off their rhythm and their line in particular,” Matthew Hayden admitted afterwards. Crucially, three of those wides came from Kagiso Rabada and two from Rashid Khan, the overseas linchpins expected to set the tone. Rabada closed with 2 for 42, Rashid 1 for 39, while Mohammed Siraj endured a tough night at 1 for 48.
“KG Rabada’s figures, I think, were a bit more expensive than perhaps what he bowled today. I thought he was actually pretty good and same too with Rashid,” Hayden said. “Siraj had an off day, simple as that. When we reviewed his pitch map, he was a little bit too short, a little bit too wide, and that’s just a great bowler just having an off day. Whereas I thought Rashid actually could have had a much better day. It could have been a couple more wickets in the wicket column and so too with KG Rabada as well.”
Hayden felt Rabada drifted leg-side too often, while good-length balls strayed a touch wide of off stump. “If anything, KG bowled a little bit of a leg-stumpy line, back of a length. And short-of-a-length, good-length balls tended to be a fraction wide of off stump. But we’re splitting hairs in many ways. Batters have the intent now to score quickly.”
Even so, the assistant coach accepts basics must be nailed. “It just shows you the margins in these games – this is a loss by six runs – are so small,” he stressed. “But the point is definitely noted in terms of the discipline and wides and just those abilities of our bowlers to keep consistently bowling their best ball.”
The batting numbers tell another story. In their opener against Punjab Kings the Titans struck 15 fours to PBKS’s six yet trailed badly on sixes, three to fourteen. The pattern resurfaced on Saturday: GT hit 24 fours to RR’s 18 but were out-slugged on maximums, seven to twelve.
“When we saw both sides hit plenty of boundaries and the dot balls is also another thing that I looked at in our batting in the last game,” Hayden observed. “Actually, when we looked at the Punjab Kings game versus us, they were much better boundary-hitters than us. We were better at actually strike rotation.”
Chasing 210, GT sat pretty at 103 for 1 after ten overs – almost the perfect launchpad – yet stumbled as Ravi Bishnoi applied the brakes. The leg-spinner removed Shubman Gill and B. Sai Sudharsan in successive overs, figures of 3 for 28 swinging the match. From 107 for 1 the Titans fell to 161 for 5, leaving too much for the lower order despite Rashid’s late cameo.
Aaron Finch praised Bishnoi’s subtle pace changes on television commentary, calling the spell “the decisive phase”. Ambati Rayudu highlighted the way Bishnoi “kept attacking the stumps, daring batsmen to hit against the turn,” while analyst Gaurav Sundararaman pointed out that the Titans scored at just 6.50 an over against spin, compared with 11.20 against pace.
There were positives: Sai Sudharsan’s fluent 54, Gill’s measured 42 and Rashid’s 17 from six balls underlined depth. Yet with trips to Chennai and Kolkata looming, Hayden knows the wider picture cannot wait. “We’re two games in, so there’s no panic,” he said, “but you also don’t want habits to settle. T20 is unforgiving – one or two percent off and you’re behind the eight ball.”
Tightening lines, cutting the extras and finding a few more rows beyond the ropes: the prescription is simple to state, tougher to deliver. The Titans have six days to make it stick.
