By Suneer Chowdhary
A couple of days ago, the Kolkata Knight Riders had failed to chase down a target of 133 at the Eden Gardens. They probably missed their opener from the previous seasons, Chris Gayle in their line-up.
Published: Apr 22, 2011, 07:14 PM (IST)
Edited: Apr 22, 2011, 07:14 PM (IST)
Bangalore beat Kolkata by 9 wickets
By Suneer Chowdhary
Kolkata: Apr 22, 2011
A couple of days ago, the Kolkata Knight Riders had failed to chase down a target of 133 at the Eden Gardens. They probably missed their opener from the previous seasons, Chris Gayle in their line-up. Today, there was that presence of Gayle that they had missed but unfortunately for them, he was batting for the opponents.
Gayle, who hadn’t been initially picked by the IPL franchises in the auction, did more than his bit to ensure that the other nine teams would have been probably left, regretting that decision.
A target of 172 posed a serious threat. At the end of the first three overs, Bangalore had scored only 17, with Gayle having got to only three.
In the fourth over, he showed his first signs of aggression when slamming an L Balaji full-toss to the fence. In the next, Jaidev Unadkat was flicked for a four and a six. The Powerplay overs were rounded off with another 11 off Shakib al Hasan’s first over and suddenly the Knight Riders were 57 without loss.
The real carnage began after this.
Shakib’s comeback over was carted for a couple of sixed by Gayle before Pathan got a taste of his own medicine as he slammed two boundaries and a huge six over the deep mid-wicket.
Gayle’s half-century had come off 29 balls; having five fours and four sixes in it. And the assault continued after that. Manoj Tiwary was welcomed to the bowling crease with a couple of sixes and Rajat Bhatia, after conceding just four in his first over, went for 17 in his second.
By this time, the asking rate had come down from 8.5 to six runs an over and despite the dismissal of the much calmer Tillakaratne Dilshan at the other end, the Royal Challengers Bangalore cruised to an easy win.
Virat Kohli joined Gayle and completed the formalities 18.1 overs with the opening batsman’s century coming off 55 balls. There were 17 hits to the fence, seven of which were sixes. Fittingly, it was Gayle who finished the game off with a boundary, which also got him to the third century of this year’s IPL.
Earlier, the Kolkata Knight Riders had started off rather well and capitalised on that platform to propel the side to 171 for five in their 20 overs.
Daniel Vettori fielded first after winning the toss but he wasn’t aided by his opening bowlers. Zaheer Khan continued to look below par in the World Cup while Sreenath Aravind’s inexperience showed up in the game.
Kolkata’s 50 came in the sixth over for the loss of Brad Haddin’s wicket even as the pair of Jacques Kallis and Gautam Gambhir consolidated through their second-wicket stand.
The duo was involved in a 58-run stand for the second wicket and with the platform set, Yusuf Pathan did his bit in the end to push the Kolkata Knight Riders to 171 for five in their 20 overs.
Gambhir made 48, while Pathan’s 46 came off 24 balls. Zaheer went for 53 runs in his four overs.
Kolkata had gone into the game with Jaidev Unadkat and Brad Haddin in place of Brett Lee and Manvinder Bisla. Bangalore got in Chris Gayle in place of Mayank Agarwal and Sreenath Aravind instead of Johan van der Wath.
Brief Scores: KKR 171 for 5 in 20 overs (Yusuf Pathan 48, Gautam Gambhir 46, S Aravind 2 for 37, Syed Mohammad 1 for 20) lost to RCB 175 for 1 in 18.1 overs (Chris Gayle 102*, T Dilshan 38; L Balaji 1 for 43, Iqbal Abdulla 0 for 12) by 9 wickets.
Man of the Match: Chris Gayle
(Suneer is a Mumbai-based cricket writer and can be contacted at suneerchowdhary@gmail.com and Tweets here @suneerchowdhary)
Pictures © AFP
