The expected Saturday night party for the home side Royal Challengers Bangalore never happened as Rajasthan Royals coasted to a seven-wicket victory in the DLF-Indian Premier League match at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium.
Chasing Royal Challengers’ 135, Rajasthan Royals thrived on a 104-run third-wicket partnership between Graeme Smith (49) and Shane Watson (61 n.o., 41b, 8x4, 2x6) to score the winning runs in 17.1 overs.
Chasing a moderate target can be tricky and with Praveen Kumar snapping up Mahesh Rawat in the first over, Royal Challengers seemed to be playing out their “Game for life” advertisement slogan.
Pathan blitzes
However Yusuf Pathan blitzed five fours in a 12-ball 21 to settle the initial nerves. Pathan edged Zaheer to retrace his steps but with Smith and Watson dropping anchor as well as flexing batting muscle, Rajasthan Royals laid claim to a warm night.
Smith’s short-arm pull off Kallis froze the fielders and he brushed aside a vociferous appeal after Zaheer rapped his pads, to continue tormenting the bowlers, offering a dour blade as well as skipping out to Sunil Joshi and scooping one over the bowler’s head.
An attempt to do an encore though undid him but by then the visitor needed just six runs to seal the match and take its points tally to six points from four matches.
Watson meanwhile waded into a Praveen Kumar over with a sequence of 4, 6, 4, 4, 4 and 4 as he toyed on either side of the pitch, driving, whipping and lofting with élan. Anil Kumble, coming back from a groin injury and a surprise-inclusion in the Royal Challengers playing eleven as Dravid perhaps wanted to catch the rivals off-guard, bowled a tight spell but was hampered by the meagre total posted by Royal Challengers.
Top-order collapses
Earlier, Royal Challengers’ top-order found the fielders near the ropes to strangle itself as the batsmen rushed their shots.
Skipper Rahul Dravid hooked the first delivery he faced from Shane Watson, straight to Ravindra Jadeja. Shivnarine Chanderpaul charged at Watson and miscued while Jacques Kallis was caught off-balance while pulling Munaf Patel and found the fielder at backward square-leg.
And while his partners departed, Ross Taylor (44, 20b, 6x4, 3x6) plonked his front foot and hit through the line with minimum swivel and maximum power.
The scores:
Royal Challengers Bangalore: S. Chanderpaul c Jadeja b Watson 2, R. Dravid c Jadeja b Watson 0, R. Taylor c Smith b Munaf 44, J. Kallis c Munaf b Trivedi 11, V. Kohli c Rawat b Munaf 13, M. Boucher c Rawat b Warne 4, Praveen (run out) 34, S. Joshi (run out) 3, Zaheer (not out) 17, Vinay (not out) 1; Extras: (lb-2, nb-1, w-3): 6; Total: (for eight wkts. in 20 overs) 135.
Fall of wickets: 1-1, 2-16, 3-59, 4-65, 5-77, 6-78, 7-90, 8-131.
Rajasthan Royals bowling: Watson 4-0-20-2, Tanvir 4-0-31-0, Munaf 3-0-20-2, Trivedi 4-0-29-1, Warne 4-1-23-1, Pathan 1-0-10-0.
Rajasthan Royals: G. Smith c Kumble b Joshi 49, M. Rawat c Boucher b Praveen 0, Y. Pathan c Boucher b Zaheer 21, S. Watson (not out) 61, Kaif (not out) 4; Extras: (lb-1, w-2): 3; Total: (for three wkts. in 17.1 overs) 138.
Fall of wickets: 1-1, 2-26, 3-130.
Royal Challengers Bangalore bowling: Praveen 3-0-42-1, Zaheer 4-0-24-1, Vinay 2-0-15-0, Kumble 4-0-22-0, Kallis 1-0-7-0, Joshi 3.1-0-27-1.
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