After Phil Salt and Devdutt Padikkal fell for low scores at strike-rates of under 100 on Wednesday, Patidar lifted the tempo of RCB’s chase with three sixes and a four in his first 12 balls to score 27 at a strike rate of over 200. Patidar’s dismissal, that came while he was trying to hit Prince Yadav down the ground, too was a consequence of him operating at top gear.

“They are going after every ball. The captain is doing that so the team is following that tempo and that template. Whenever you see Patidar walk in, he comes with a lot of intent,” Rayudu said on ESPNcricinfo’s TimeOut show. “It is rubbing off on his non-striker as well as the batters who are following. It is quite refreshing to see RCB play that way.

“Playing on a slow wicket, they adapted way better than the way Lucknow’s batters did. It was a slow wicket, they had to adjust their shots and their bat swing but they played some fantastic shots. Generally, we have seen a lot of sixes against loose balls, but this batting line-up has been hitting sixes against really good deliveries. That’s a great sign.”

“That’s just a batting unit with a lot of confidence,” Finch said. “You can see the gap between the teams on the top of the table and the bottom. That was again evident today. They go with a similar structure on how they go about their run-chases. They go hard even when the game [is in their grasp].

“It would’ve been easy in that situation for one of their batters to get 25 not out, but no, that’s not how they play cricket in Bengaluru now. They continue to stick to their guns, they play to their strengths. If the match up is theirs, they go for it. They put to bed games quite comfortably.

“The consequences of when you do that [watchful batting when games are in control], then you lose credibility. [Team-mates might feel] that If someone is prepared to just knock it around and look out for themselves, then, next time they might do that too because they’re worried about next year’s contract. That’s how [team] cultures crumble so quickly. The fact that they went out and did what they talked about – brilliant.”

Rayudu also pointed to how that approach in this “amazing team” is now becoming a non-negotiable: “Everyone is fitting beautifully into Patidar’s template and they want to fit in,” Rayudu said. “Without that kind of positive intent, I don’t think they’d be looked at for staying in the XI, they’d be dropped. That’s a great attitude to have and it looks like an amazing team that puts the team in front of everything else.”