Prince Yadav bowls Kohli for rare IPL chase duck

A 140.4 kph ball can change the mood of a cricket ground in half a second.

Virat Kohli walked in as the chase master, the man crowds expect to control chaos. He walked back for 0, his off-stump knocked out by a sharp inswinger from Prince Yadav.

For RCB, it was not just an early wicket. It was the kind of moment that makes a big chase feel heavier than the scoreboard.

Kohli’s rare chase failure

Kohli getting out cheaply is news. Kohli getting out for a duck while chasing is an event.

This was his first duck in an IPL chase since 2017. That is a long stretch, especially for a batter who has built his reputation on hunting targets.

The dismissal came in the second over. Prince Yadav pitched one full enough, quick enough, and straight enough to ask a serious question.

Kohli misread the movement. The ball came in sharply and hit the off-stump. No drama was needed after that.

There was another neat piece of history attached to the wicket. After Dhawal Kulkarni in 2016, Prince became only the second bowler in IPL history to dismiss Kohli for 0.

That tells you two things at once. Kohli’s consistency has been absurd. Prince’s ball was not a lucky accident.

Lucknow’s batting set the trap

Before that wicket, Lucknow Super Giants had already done the hard work with the bat.

Rain kept interrupting their innings, and the match was reduced to 19 overs per side. These shortened games can be tricky. Batters must attack, but they also cannot lose shape.

Lucknow handled that balance better. They put up 208 in 19 overs, leaving RCB with a target of 209.

Mitchell Marsh was the big reason. He made 111, a proper match-shaping hundred in a rain-hit contest.

That innings did not just add runs. It gave Lucknow the emotional control of the match.

Nicholas Pooran added 38, keeping the pressure high in the middle overs. Captain Rishabh Pant stayed unbeaten on 32, giving the innings a clean finish.

For RCB, Josh Hazlewood, Krunal Pandya, and Rasikh Salam Dar took 1 wicket each. But they could not stop the scoring rate from climbing.

A target above 200 in 19 overs asks for almost everything to go right. Losing Kohli in the second over was the opposite.

RCB’s chase kept slipping

RCB’s opening pair was gone with only 9 on the board. In a chase this big, that is like starting a marathon uphill.

Rajat Patidar and Devdutt Padikkal then brought RCB back into the contest. Their 95-run stand for the third wicket gave the dugout some belief.

Patidar, as captain, had to do more than score. He had to calm the innings after the early shock.

Padikkal also played a useful hand, keeping RCB within sight of the asking rate. For a while, the chase looked alive.

But big chases punish one loose phase. Once Patidar fell, RCB started losing wickets in clusters.

Tim David tried to pull the match back late. His 40 from 17 balls had the kind of violence that makes fielders panic.

Still, RCB needed too much from too few balls. Lucknow won by 9 runs through the DLS method.

DLS is the rain rule cricket uses to reset targets. It calculates what a fair score should be after interruptions.

Fans often grumble about it, because it can feel cold and mathematical. But on this night, Lucknow had earned its edge.

Prince Yadav grabs the spotlight

For Prince Yadav, this was the sort of spell young bowlers dream about.

He did not merely remove a famous batter. He shaped the whole chase by removing Kohli before RCB could settle.

His final tally was 3 wickets. In a high-scoring match, that is worth plenty.

Young Indian quicks often get judged harshly in the IPL. One bad over can follow them for weeks.

But nights like this change a dressing room’s view. They also make selectors and coaches look twice.

Prince showed pace, control, and nerve. The Kohli wicket will get the highlights, but the 3-wicket spell won him respect.

Shahbaz Ahmed also played his part with 2 wickets. Together, they made sure RCB never fully escaped the pressure.

That is the hidden art of defending a big total. You do not need magic every over. You need regular blows at the right time.

Lucknow found those blows. RCB kept finding hope, then losing it.

A result with two stories

This match will be remembered in two very different ways.

For RCB fans, it will sting because Kohli’s duck came in a chase. They have seen him build impossible wins from calm starts and controlled risk.

When he falls early, everyone else has to bat one spot higher in pressure. That changes shot selection, timing, and mood.

For Lucknow, the result strengthens belief. Marsh gave them the runs, Pant finished the innings, and Prince gave them the spark with the ball.

That combination matters in a long IPL season. Teams do not survive only on star power. They need new names to win hard moments.

Kohli will move on, because great players do. One duck does not erase a season of form.

But cricket loves these small reversals. A young bowler runs in, a legend misjudges one ball, and the match tilts.

For ordinary fans, that is still the charm of the IPL. Reputation walks in first, but performance has the final word.