Gleanings from the final
1 The decision at the toss was a strange one. RR had won the last match chasing with their bowlers using the bounce in the pitch superbly and setting their batters a below-par total. They are a side that like to chase, that believe in chasing. Sanju Samson is on the record saying pitches change and help chasing sides in T20 cricket played in the night. Yet they chose to bat.
2 Is Jos Buttler's approach sustainable? It is perhaps necessitated by a thin batting line-up where R Ashwin bats at No. 7 but backloading as heavily as Buttler has done in two matches against GT leaves him no choice but to bat through and accelerate massively in the end. Against an attack of GT's quality, it is not always possible.
3 Hardik Pandya the bowler is great news. Pandya bowling without fear of injury and using his bounce and brains is great news for India. He bowled ahead of Sai Kishore because of a poor match-up for Kishore but then he saw the pitch had something in it and he went on to pick the big three of RR: Samson, Buttler and Hetmyer.
4 The best bowling unit has won. Titans had incredible depth in their bowling attack where they could afford to not even bowl one of the bowlers if the match-up wasn't great. In the end that side has prevailed.
On that note, thanks for following us here through this IPL. It was great fun. Do head over to our commentary for more from the celebrations and presentation.
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