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Emphatic Bangalore smother hapless Pune

By Jamie Alter

 

A target of 182, set up by Chris Gayle and Virat Kohli, proved too much for a struggling Pune Warriors who slumped to a 26-run defeat against Royal Challengers Bangalore.

Emphatic Bangalore smother hapless Pune

Bangalore pipped Pune by 26 runs Pictures © AFP

By Jamie Alter

 

Bengaluru: Apr 29, 2011

 

A target of 182, set up by Chris Gayle and Virat Kohli, proved too much for a struggling Pune Warriors who slumped to a 26-run defeat against Royal Challengers Bangalore. Having put up a challenging total, RCB performed their duties in the field efficiently to become the second team to win five matches in IPL 2011, thereby moving up two places to third in the league table. Conversely, a fifth consecutive defeat now leaves the richest franchise at the bottom of the IPL pile.

 

Put in to bat, RCB were given a rousing start from their main man. Gayle got off the mark by fending a short ball to fine leg, but there was nothing restrained about strokes that raced to the boundaries at extra cover, long-off, long-on and point. Against Kamran Khan, Gayle began by rushing down and scything the ball past extra cover for four, then crashed two sixes over long-off and long-on before finishing the over with four more past cover.

 

That over went for 20, and Kamran’s second over cost 17. First Gayle swung to midwicket for four, then leaned forward and drove six over long-off, and finished off by slashing over point for six more. It was fabulous hitting.

 

With RCB’s run rate 9.50, Rahul Sharma struck to remove Tillakaratne Dilshan and with Yuvraj Singh slowed things down, giving the batsmen no pace to work with. Sharma was rather handy with his control, while Yuvraj kept things tidy, making sure PW stayed in consolidation mode for a considerable period. RCB managed only 48 runs – with one six and two fours – between the seventh and 14th over.

 

But Kohli accelerated his game efficiently, hitting Sharma for six and four in a 14-run 15th over and then driving Jesse Ryder exquisitely through extra cover for four. Successive sixes off Jerome Taylor – a flick over deep square leg and a top edge over third man – took Kohli past 1000 IPL runs before being dismissed for 67 off 42. In the process, Kohli also wrested the orange cap from Sachin Tendulkar to take his run tally to 294 for IPL 2011.PW then clawed back by getting Saurabh Tiwary and conceding just six off the final over, but 181 proved a challenging total.

 

PW’s chase began with Ryder timing the ball sweetly, but a sluggish Tim Paine consumed 17 balls for eight runs before he swished Sreenath Aravind to fine leg. Ryder continued to play positively even though the boundaries dried up, while Manish Pandey struggled to time his shots against Daniel Vettori and Abhimanyu Mithun.

 

At 63 for 1 in 10 overs chasing 182, PW had got themselves into a jam. Ryder picked up the pace when Mithun returned for a third over, pulling four and six to cross fifty, but threw it away in J Syed Mohammad’s first over when he picked out deep midwicket.

 

Needing to do something desperate after Pandey’s exit for 19, Yuvraj smashed 16 off the first three deliveries of Mohammad’s second over to leave the equation for PW 55 off 24, only to fall after the strategic time-out for 41 off 23. With that, PW had officially been snuffed out of the match.

 

Man of the Match: Virat Kohli.

 

Brief Scores: RCB 181 for 5 in 20 overs (Virat Kohli 67, Chris Gayle 49, AB de Villiers 26; Alfonso Thomas 2 for 23, Rahul Sharma 2 for 27) beat PWI 155 for 5 in 20 overs (Jesse Ryder 51, Yuvraj Singh 41; Chris Gayle 1 for 9, Daniel Vettori 1 for 23, J Syed Mohammad 1 for 26) by 26 runs.

 

(Jamie Alter is a freelance cricket writer, having worked at ESPNcricinfo and All Sports Magazine. He is the author of two books, The History of World Cup Cricket and Field of Dreams: The Story of the Dr. DY Patil Sports Stadium. His twitter feed is @jamie_alter) 

 

 

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