Press Trust of India
Bangalore, April 13: Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) made a mockery of Royal Challengers Bangalore’s (RCB) total of 166 runs by romping home with 16 balls to spare with eight wickets in hand at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium here Monday.
Chasing a ‘not so easy’ kind of target, David Warner (57, 27b, 6×4, 4×6) and Shikhar Dhawan (50, 42b, 4×4, 2×6) made mincemeat of Bangalore’s bowling attack by going on the aggressive from the onset and took the team total to 50 inside four overs.
Virat Kohli was left helpless by his pacers who were taken for plenty by the openers. Even foreign recruit Sean Abbott failed to get it right against two of the most destructive batsmen in the world. Dhawan was the calmer of the two openers as Warner tried to finish to match as early as possible to get an early shower.
Warner’s innings was cut short in the eight over by Yuzvendra Chahal (2/28) when he was trapped him in front of the wicket. Chahal raised the hopes of his captain when he dismissed Kane Williamson off his next over to get the Bangalore crowd on their feet.
However Lokesh Rahul (44, 28b, 4×4, 1×6) came in at no. 3 and added 78 runs with Dhawan to take the game away from the hosts. Rahul heaved the bowlers high into the night sky as Kohli’s actress girlfriend Anushka Sharma watched on with a disappointed look on her face.
Earlier put into bat RCB were bundled out in 19.5 overs. Kohli (41, 37b, 4×4, 2×6) and Chris Gayle (21) began well for the home side. Praveen Kumar struck in the sixth over to remove Gayle but Kohli got on with the game by adding a 34 runs for the second wicket with Dinesh Karthik. However SRH got back into the game when all-rounder Ravi Bopara (2/31) struck off consecutive deliveries to get rid of Kohli and Mandeep Singh.
RCB then turned to their experienced campaigner AB de Villiers (46, 28b, 5×4, 2×6) to bail them out of the situation and he exactly did that by playing an attacking innings to take the score past the 150-run mark. Trent Boult (3/36) then pegged back RCB by dismissing De Villiers, Abbott and Harshal Patel in his last over and handed back the advantage to his team.
Brief scores
RCB 166 in 19.5overs (AB de Villiers 46, Virat Kohli 41; Trent Boult 3/36, Bhuvneshwar Kumar 2/30, Ravi Bopara 2/31) lost to SRH 172 for two (David Warner 57, Shikhar Dhawan 50 n o; Yuzvendra Chahal 2/28) by eight wickets.
Caption
Slayer-Pair: David Warner (L) and Shikhar Dhawan in action enroute to their half-centuries against RCB, Monday
