Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) snapped their losing streak with a commanding 35-run victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad in Match 41 of the 2024 Indian Premier League (IPL) at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium on Thursday, 25 April.
Having set a competitive target of 207 runs, led by du Plessis, RCB successfully contained Pat Cummins' SRH to 171/8 in 20 overs, securing their second win of the season.
Early Blows For SRH
Continuing the pursuit, SRH faced a significant setback when their key batter Travis Head fell early, dismissed by Will Jacks in the opening over after scoring just one run off three balls. The visiting team gained another crucial breakthrough when Yash Dayal removed Abhishek Sharma in the 4th over, who departed after contributing 31 runs from 13 deliveries.
Swapnil Singh then made an impact with two quick wickets in the 5th over, dismissing Aiden Markram and Heinrich Klaasen, leaving the hosts in a precarious position at 56/4.
RCB maintained their stronghold as Karn Sharma claimed SRH's fifth wicket, dismissing Nitish Reddy for 13 runs off 13 balls in the 8th over. Sharma struck again in the 10th over, removing Abdul Samad after his brief knock of 10 runs off 6 deliveries.
The Green Impact
In the 14th over, SRH saw their skipper Cummins depart to Cameron Green's delivery, with Mohammed Siraj securing the catch. Cummins left the field after scoring a valuable 31 runs off 15 balls for his team. Green continued his impact by claiming his second wicket of the evening in the 16th over, dismissing Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who had contributed 13 runs off 13 deliveries before his departure.
As the final over commenced, SRH required 44 runs to win. However, Jaydev Unadkat (8 runs off 10 balls) and Shahbaz Ahmed (40 runs off 37 balls) could only guide their team to a total of 171/8.
Unadkat's Three-fer
In the first innings, Rajat Patidar and Virat Kohli struck half-centuries in contrasting fashion as Royal Challengers Bengaluru posted 206/7 in 20 overs despite a three-fer by Jaydev Unadkat in his 100th match.
Kohli scored his fifty off 37 balls while Patidar hammered his half-century off just 19 balls as RCB posted another 200-plus score after skipper Faf du Plessis opted to bat first.
Unadkat applied the brakes on the free-scoring RCB innings by claiming the key wickets of Patidar, Kohli and Mahipal Lomror for a fine haul of 3-30 off four overs. Cameron Green (37 off 20) and Impact Player Swapnil Singh (12 off 6 balls) unleashed some big shots in the death overs as RCB crossed the 200-run mark again in IPL 2024.
Kohli's Slow Fifty
The introduction of T. Natarajan brought Plesis’ downfall when he holed out near the deep cover boundary trying to maintain the RCB scoring tempo in Power-play.
Though he was out for 25, RCB raced to 61/1 in Power-play and though Kohli's scoring rate went down, Rajat Patidar made up for that. RCB were going strong despite losing Will Jacks cheaply for six after he played over a slower one from spinner Mayank Markande to make it 65/2.
Kohli completed a slow half-century off 37 deliveries, hitting four boundaries and one six. Rajat Patidar more than made up for the slow going from Kohli with a blazing half-century off 19 deliveries. Kohli and Patidar raised 65 runs for the third wicket partnership with the latter doing the bulk of scoring. The half-century of their partnership came in 23 balls with Patidar scoring 45 off them.
SRH Pulled Things Back
However, SRH pulled things back a bit after Patidar fell by the sword, trying to play another big one but managed to flick the slow full toss from Jaydev Unadkat into the hands of Abdul Samad.
Kohli was removed by Unadkat as he got him to hole out to Samad as the former RCB skipper failed to break free from the shackles. Mahipal Lomror was out cheaply but Cameron Green played a fine cameo and with the help of Dinesh Karthik (11 off 6) helped RCB reach a defendable total.
Green struck his Australia skipper Cummins for a couple of fours in the 15th over and repeated the same in the 19th over while Swapnil Singh landed a couple of lusty blows in the final over to prop up RCB.
With inputs from IANS.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)