ROYAL WIN FOR THE CHALLENGERS

Bangalore Royal Challengers are back on track with the third consecutive win. They had a straight and a massive 9 wicket victory against Mumbai Indians. Jacques Kallis guided the team for their 4th win by easing the chase of 150 runs, set up by Mumbai which had brilliant half-centuries of Sanath Jayasurya and Dwayne Bravo. Bangalore dominated the game right from the first over they bowled.

Dillon du Preez stood as the star bowler for the bangalore, who took the wickets of Sachin Tendulkar and A Madhukar Rahane in the consecutive balls of the innings third over. Before the MI’s could do something to patch up the early loss of their star batsman, they were hit by Preez again for an expensive loss of Duminy, who was in a great form since a couple of matches. Inspite of these hurdles Sanath continued to shine his bat and completed his half century (52 in 43 balls-4×6  6×1). Sanath was sent back by van der Merwe, in an attempt for a shot but fell short in moving to the fence and was caught by V Kumar. Sanath fell apart in the 14th over. Team managed to keep a score of just 84 upto that point. It was the phase of the game where the Mumbai batsmen had to just wave the bat and try to escort the ball out the players arena whether the ball was good enough to be put with the pain or not, and this was what exactly done by Bravo and Abhishek Nayar. A bliztering 50 of Bravo in just 40 balls with one 4 and two sixes, and a significant contribution of 27 from Nayars bat in 20 balls with four 4’s helped them to draw 47 runs in the last three overs of their innings. This kept the Mumbai live in the game, good enough score to defend with their star bowlers.

Kallis striked every ball in his way. Wasim Jaffer who played his first match in IPL-2 opened his innings with kallis. He departed early for 7 to Zaheer Khan caught by Nayar in the 3rd over when the score was 24. Robin Uthappa joined the party later. For the first time in second season Uthappa shined with the bat. Both of the batsmen completed their half-century. It was delightful to watch Kallis hitting Mumbai’s star bowler Lasith Malinga for two consecutive sixes, earlier one on the leg side with just a flip of the bat, used pace of the ball and gifted to the crowd. Latter one on the off side, striked the ball moving away from the bowler. Zaheer injured his left arm while an attempt to stop a ball running to the fence driven by Uthappa. He left the field as he couldn’t continue. This was a big blow to the Masters team as he was the only successful bowler up to that point in the match, with just 12 runs in two overs and a wicket of Jaffer. None could control the rushing bats of both of them even the batsmen themselves. Kallis (69 in 59 balls- 4×5  6×2) and Uthappa (66 in just 42 balls- 4×8 6×2) stood unbeaten and grabbed the match away from Mumbai. Kallis was chosen as “Man of the Match”.

Bangalore dominated in all of the departments, all along the match. Team seems to be great under Kumble’s captaincy with the second consecutive win. Team is boosted up with confidence by this win and the return of the Man in form “Rahul Dravid”.