There is one underrated luxury that only the inexperienced can afford: the freedom to look like a 'dumb duck'. Riyan Parag, stepping into his first full-time captaincy role with Rajasthan Royals, was willing to wear that cloak without hesitation or shame.

It, of course, came with a potential pay-off: the dismissal of Sanju Samson.

In the second over of the game, he stationed Ravindra Jadeja at short third, and asked Jofra Archer to control deep backward point - placing two of his most athletic players in positions that don't usually require the best to be there. In doing so, he sent a signal to Samson, the in-form opener now donning a new yellow jersey, of which areas his former teammate wanted him to hit towards.

Parag took his chance, and with some movement on offer for the pacers, gave Samson the bait to cut early in his innings. Samson didn't fall for it right away, but he was left a bit uncomfortable trying to access new areas of scoring while the pacers tempted him, and setting up his fall. As the pressure of a slow start mounted, Nandre Burger teased him with a few inswingers, before getting one to move away and hit the top of off stump.

It looked an outstanding delivery in isolation, but it was a poetry of planning that had been set in motion. The funky field-set laid out by Parag paid off, and the fielders moved to their more familiar positions.

For as unconventional as that strategy was, it was driven by the data crunched by the team analyst, Parag confessed. "It was the first three balls or first four balls [against Sanju] that we wanted to execute something. That kind of went well, so we went ahead with it (the unconventional position for Jadeja)," Parag admitted.

"We were just trying to target where he plays his first three to five balls. We set the fielders accordingly and asked him to hit a better shot or hit a different shot, which is, again, a gamble of sorts. But then that gives us a lot of percentage in our favour. The shot he got out to, we would have wanted him to hit that shot instead of bowling short to him and him pulling it, because he likes that. We just try to make decision-making a bit challenging for the batters."

That dismissal set the tone for CSK's collapse. Archer and Burger's rapid spell upfront, with movement and tight lines, had already made run-scoring a bit of a challenge early on. And Samson's dismissal opened the gates for the bowlers to attack the more inexperienced lot in CSK's top-order.

Ayush Mhatre was undone by Burger's pacy bouncer, Matt Short was tricked by Sandeep Sharma's lack of speed, and Ruturaj Gaikwad was pushed under the pump after a slow start, forcing him to play an ugly hack and have his stumps knocked over by Archer, leaving the five-time champions four wickets down within the powerplay.

"We just try and execute," he added. "If it comes off, looks very good. If it doesn't come off and he gets hit for a few cuts, I'll be sitting here like a dumb duck."

While the toss did go in favour of Royals on a gloomy evening - where there was just a bit of moisture on the surface courtesy a spell of rain only a few hours before the match - everything else fell in place with what they had wanted: to play 'smart cricket' and execute well. While they made adequate use of favourable conditions, their efforts were also aided by the CSK batters, who crumbled in the face of a double whammy of quick wickets and a slow scoring rate. Their inexperience began to come to the fore as they attempted to wriggle themselves out of that situation.

The panic was evident with the dismissal of Gaikwad. But in Jadeja's first over with his old team, they made it worse for themselves. Earlier in the fourth over, CSK were compelled to call on their Impact Player - Sarfaraz Khan, who ditched his newly developed open stance which he has been adopting at practise, for a more conventional approach, and gave signs of being in control of the situation. In the company of Short and debutant Kartik Sharma, he promised to revive the innings. However, that promise too withered away soon.

A wild swipe, that he usually executes well against spinners, was missed against Jadeja, who had him pinged on his pads in front of the stumps. Shivam Dube announced himself in the middle with a powerful six, but the need to put the pressure back on to the bowler meant that he was back in the dugout even before the next over could start, getting caught at long off while being unable to channel his ultra-aggressive hitting.

The eventual gulf in the result - an 8-wicket win with nearly eight overs to spare - was as much due to sharp plans and disciplined bowling by Royals and the blazing half-century from Vaibhav Suryavanshi, as it had to do with CSK's inability to handle pressure with the bat, read the game situation and shot selection - to go with their dropped catches and other fielding lapses later in the game.

It was a day when they just didn't turn up. Injury-hit, and without their team patriarch, they looked completely out of sting for a fight. "Our batsmen struggled to adjust to that movement early," Michael Hussey, CSK's batting coach, admitted after the team's loss on Monday. "If we had our time again, maybe we would have been a little bit more cautious and tried to get through that first six overs without losing too many wickets. But it's easy to say that in hindsight, isn't it?

"The way the game is being played these days, they want to be aggressive, they want to play their shots. Probably the conditions weren't quite right for that today. We need to take the lessons from this game that if the conditions aren't perfect, maybe we need to adjust our sights a little bit and try and score our runs in different areas. We'll definitely take a few learnings from it. But we want to try and put this one behind us pretty quickly and move on "

While there would be lessons to carry, the CSK coach hopes that's all they take with them as additional baggage on their flight back to Chennai, leaving behind self-doubts at the same venue where they showcased their poor shot selections.

Trying to add perspective to the poor shot selections, especially by a host of fairly experienced players, Hussey added, "It's never ideal to lose the early wickets. It puts players in an awkward situation. Which way do they go? Do they try and soak up a bit of pressure, maybe score a little bit slower but preserve the wickets? But then sometimes you can dig yourself into a bit of a hole, so you still need to look to keep scoring.

"We want guys to be able to try and assess the situation, assess the conditions as quickly as they can and then try and play how they think. The game needs to be played in that manner. I'm sure a few guys will say, in hindsight, maybe I could have played a bit differently, but on another day it comes off and they change the momentum of the game.

"So I don't want our batsmen moving forward to have clouded thoughts or put doubts in their mind. I don't think players play their best when they're second-guessing themselves, and thinking too much. I would prefer them to come in with a clear attitude, a clear way on how they want to play, assess the conditions quickly and then back themselves. If it comes off, great. If it doesn't, well, then that's sometimes cricket. So, I don't want this performance to cloud and put doubt and fear into our team.

"We need to move forward quickly with a positive attitude and sort of say, 'OK, yes, it wasn't a great performance'. We were outplayed today. There might be some reasons for that, but let's leave that behind and keep our positive attitude moving forward."

CSK will leave for Chennai on Tuesday a more deflated unit than the one that had landed in Guwahati. Maybe, they were the ones looking like the 'dumb ducks' eventually on Monday against the enterprising Royals. But that's the beauty of inexperience. Hope can be rested on them to improve and come good even if they folly.