Kohli's Captain knock scripts revenge victory for RCB over Sunrisers

Tags: Indian Premier League - 2013, Royal Challengers Bangalore Vs Sunrisers Hyderabad 9th Match at Bangalore - Apr 9, 2013, Virat Kohli, Cameron Leon White, Narangoda Liyanaarachchilage Thissara Chirantha Perera

Published on: Apr 09, 2013

Scorecard | Commentary | Graphs

Virat Kohli played one of the best knocks of his life to take his team Royal Challengers Bangalore to an easy 7-wicket win with 14 balls to spare.

By BV Swagath

Virat Kohli played one of the best knocks of his life to take his team Royal Challengers Bangalore to an easy 7-wicket win with 14 balls to spare. It wasn’t an easy run chase as the Sunrisers had posted 161 on the board and had a good bowling attack. But the Chinnaswamy Stadium pitch played pretty flat and Kohli was in great form once he got his eye in and was simply unstoppable.

The RCB Captain stayed right till the end of the run chase with a dream knock of 93* from 47 balls with 11 fours and 4 sixes. Poor Amit Mishra was severely treated by Kohli to end up with figures of 0 for 42 in 4 overs. RCB got their early impetus from opener Mayank Agarwal who had even outscored Chris Gayle comfortably. Mayank stroked his way to an impressive 29 from 20 balls with 3 fours and 2 sixes before getting bounced out by Thisara Perera.

Chris Gayle batted out 15 balls for his 13 before he was caught behind off Ishant Sharma. RCB was on the backfoot at 47 for 2 in 6.1 overs. AB de Villiers playing his first game supported Kohli in a decent partnership but his innings was cut short to a run-a-ball 15 after pulling a long hop to deep mid wicket. Kohli continued to play his shots confidently and all along got RCB home inside 18 overs. He was also the Man of the Match for playing a Captain’s knock. For the Sunrisers, Dale Steyn gave away only 16 off his 4 overs but couldn’t deliver any wickets for his team.

White, Perera power Sunrisers to 161: Sunrisers Hyderabad given the quality of bowling that they possess should fancy a third straight win in IPL 6 having posted a healthy total of 161 for 6 against hosts Royal Challengers Bangalore. Despite a modest first half of 62 for 3 in 10.2 overs, the Sunrisers got a perfect finish to give RCB a stiff target to chase. In a way, the RCB bowling was exposed on a good batting pitch. Their medium pacers hardly had any answers to the onslaughts from Cameron White and Thisara Perera.

Cameron White who gained a lot of self confidence following his Super Over batting the other night at Hyderabad was in great touch today at Bengaluru. The Aussie batsman smashed 52 from 34 balls with 3 fours and 3 sixes. Sri Lankan Thisara Perera played some Gayle-like shots in his power-packed cameo of 40 from 24 balls with a four and 4 sixes.

For RCB, RP Singh got 3 for 27 in 4 overs while Muralitharan bowled really well for his 1 for 23 from 4 overs.

Toss and Teams: After a thrilling tie day before yesterday, the Sunrisers Hyderabad and the Royal Challengers Bangalore will be meeting again, this time at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru. Sunrisers have won the toss and elected to bat first. They have made once change with Biplab Samantray replacing Ankit Sharma. RCB have one notable change with AB de Villiers coming in for Dilshan. India discard RP Singh gets his first game of the tournament.

Royal Challengers Bangalore: Chris Gayle, Mayank Agarwal, Virat Kohli (C), AB de Villiers, Moises Henriques, Arun Karthik (WK), Vinay Kumar, Murali Kartik, RP Singh, Jaidev Unadkat, Muttiah Muralitharan

Sunrisers Hyderabad: Akshath Reddy, Parthiv Patel (WK), Cameron White, Biplab Samantray, Hanuma Vihari, Kumar Sangakkara (C), Thisara Perera, Amit Mishra, Ashish Reddy, Dale Steyn, Ishant Sharma

Related News