Press Trust of India
Bangalore, May 7: Captain Virat Kohli smashed his second century of the season in a magnificent batting display to lead Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) to a thrilling seven-wicket win over Rising Pune Supergiants (RPS) in an IPL-IX encounter here Saturday.
Kohli struck an unbeaten 108 off just 58 balls including eight fours and seven maximums in a display of batting pyrotechnics at the Chinnaswamy Stadium here as Bangalore chased down the massive target of 192 with three balls to spare to notch up their third win in eight matches.
The RCB skipper entered into record books as he became the only batsman to score two tons in a single IPL season joining the likes of Brendon McCullum, Shane Watson, David Warner, AB de Villiers, Adam Gilchrist and Virender Sehwag to hit two IPL centuries overall.
Kohli’s ton also overshadowed an amazing late assault of 13-ball 36 that included five fours and two sixes by Shane Watson which suddenly tilted the balance of the match in favour of Bangalore after it was poised evenly a couple of overs after the halfway stage.
Kohli smashed two sixes and a four off Adam Zampa in the 18th over and two sixes off RP Singh in the 19th over to steal 18 runs from each of the two overs as Bangalore reached 195 for three in 19.3 overs.
The match also witnessed Pune captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni introducing off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin only in the 17th over and he was not used after that.
Bangalore, however, made a sedate start in their run chase but soon found the boundaries with Kohli hitting two sixes off RP Singh in the fourth over to set the tempo.
By the end of powerplay overs, Bangalore were placed at a decent 46 for no loss with both Kohli and Lokesh Rahul (38, 35b, 1×4, 2×6) going strong. Runs keep on coming with Kohli and Rahul getting the boundaries and the home side reached 81 for no loss at the halfway mark. In the 12th over, Rahul fell to Zampa and De Villiers also fell to Zampa later in the over before Kohli and Watson took over the game.
Earlier, Ajinkya Rahane and Saurabh Tiwary smashed half centuries to power Pune to an imposing 191 for six after being put into bat. While opener Rahane made 74 off 48 balls including eight boundaries and two sixes, Tiwary’s 52 came off 39 balls during which he struck nine boundaries.
