It is not often that a cricketer finds a new home and reinvents his game in the latter half of his 30s. But, Dinesh Karthik seems to have achieved that with flying colors. Although he has transitioned to a finisher over the last few years, the extent to which he has executed his plans in the first 3 games of the IPL 2022 season at RCB so far has been remarkable.

Against KKR, when a win appeared to be far away from the horizon, Shahbaz Ahmed and Dinesh Karthik paid almost no heed to the situation as they dragged the team along, and the experienced head of Karthik took the team over the finish line with a superb unbeaten 44 off 23.

“He’s just so clear with his gameplan at the moment; just knows how to get us across the line,” said captain Faf du Plessis speaking about Dinesh Karthik on Bold diaries after the win against the Rajasthan Royals. “That gives us a lot of confidence that we know that when we’re in positions like that, we’ve got him still to come.”

Director of Cricket operations Mike Hesson had a few words of praise for the veteran too. “We needed to create a partnership, but not only that, we needed to score at a rate. The fact that DK came out, got some initiative. It was probably the over of Ashwin where the game changed, where we got that momentum back, got to below 10-an-over,” he said.

How does it feel to have donned the finisher’s hat to perfection in 3 consecutive games, the last one taking the team over the winning line? The man Dinesh Karthik himself said, “It feels good, to help RCB cross the line. That’s very important, and I’m happy that I was there at the end. Shahbaz batted beautifully, the team had a good game. Up and down - that’s what you expect. I enjoyed it thoroughly, I think it was a great game.” 

How does one pull off such a feat? “Preparation. I keep saying that, it feels a little monotonous, but that’s what helps you with most aspects in life. Exams, if you’ve prepared, even if it’s a tough question paper, you’ve got a better chance of doing well. I think sport is a lot like that. Prepare well and you keep doing it. A lot of credit to a lot of people. In the lead-up to the tournament, for about two-two and a half months, I stayed in Bombay(Mumbai), practiced, and that was the difference as to where I am today. No one can take that away. Those moments when you practice alone, doing all of this, you’re visualizing these moments, trying to do well. It feels good when it comes off. But the real credit must go to them for accommodating me and helping me get here.”

He has played with perhaps the best finisher the game has ever seen. Asked about the similarities between MS Dhoni and Dinesh Karthik, captain Faf du Plessis said, “I know I see a lot of the similarities. Obviously, MS(Dhoni) is probably the best finisher in the game. But, from what I’ve seen from DK this year, he’s on that same level. I’ve played against DK for a long time, and he’s always been a very dangerous player. But the side of him that I’m seeing now, this composure, this clarity, that he just knows what he’s going to do, and that is a remarkable skill. Not a lot of people in the world have that ability to stay calm when everything is going around, it’s noisy and it’s pressure; Just to know that ‘This is what I’m gonna do’, and he just looks in control all the time. So, at the moment, he’s as good as you can get from a finisher point of view.”