Harshal Patel unknowingly 'scratched' Virat Kohli's thigh during hat-trick celebration

Royal Challengers Bangalore pacer Harshal Patel has said that he had scratched skipper Virat Kohli's thigh during his hat-trick celebration against the defending champions Mumbai Indians at Dubai International Stadium on Sunday night. Patel rattled MI's middle-order with a match-winning hat-trick as RCB registered a convincing 54-run win.

Recently, the medium-pacer admitted that he unknowingly caused some injuries to captain Virat Kohli and teammate Mohammed Siraj while celebrating his well-deserved hat-trick against the title-holders last weekend.

" (Mohammed) Siraj's leg is alright. That was the first thing I had asked him when that celebration got over but luckily, he is fine and during that celebration, I scratched Virat's thigh as well, so I did quite some damage", said Harshal Patel ahead of the RCB vs RR IPL 2021 clash on Wednesday in an interview posted on IPLT20.COM.

 Harshal Patel hat-trick

The turning point of the RCB vs MI IPL 2021 match came in the 17th over of the Rohit Sharma-led side's run chase of 166 when pacer Harshal Patel accounted for Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard, and Rahul Chahar off successive deliveries to complete his hat-trick. He castled the number 11 batsman Adam Milne as RCB registered a convincing 54-run win. MI were bundled out for 111 in the 19th over. Harshal Patel finished his spell with figures of 4/17 from his 3.1 overs at an economy rate of 5.37.

RCB vs RR: Virat Kohli & Co. make easy work of Rajasthan

Rajasthan Royals openers Evin Lewis and Yashasvi Jaiswal added 77 runs for the opening stand after being asked to bat first by RCB skipper Kohli. Once the duo was dismissed, RR's momentum was derailed as they kept losing wickets at regular intervals and were eventually restricted to 149/9 from their 20 overs as Harshal Patel once again starred with the ball by accounting for the former champions' batsmen Riyan Parag, Chris Morris, and tail-ender Chetan Sakariya respectively. He was once again the pick of the bowlers for RCB with figures of 3/34 from his four overs at an economy rate of 8.50. 

In reply, wicket-keeper batsman S Bharat (44) and Glenn Maxwell (50*) successfully anchored RCB's chase as the three-time finalists got over the line by seven wickets in the 18th over.