Virat Kohli’s Smashing Innings Led RCB To A Glorious Victory Over Kings XI Punjab

Virat Kohli once again glorified his team with his stunning performance in a nail-biting match of ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) on Wednesday at the Chinnaswamy stadium. RCB defeated Kings XI Punjab by 82 runs.

Due to rain disruption, the match was delayed by one hour and 45 minutes which brought Duckworth-Lewis method into play and the match was reduced to a 15 over contest.

Punjab won the toss and opted to bowl first, for RCB Virat Kohli and Chris Gayle set foot on the ground and they gave their team a blazing start. Man of the match Kohli set a new record by smashing his fourth century in this IPL season. He smashed 113 runs off 50 balls with 8 sixes and 12 fours.

On the other hand, Gayle was also on fire against Punjab as he struck 73 runs off 32 balls with 8 huge sixes and 4 fours.

Punjab skipper Murali Vijay made some desperate efforts to break the partnership of Gayle and Kohli but he failed as both of the batsmen were on a full roll.

They made first 50 in just 4.4 overs and first 100 for RCB came in 8.5 overs. Vijay used as many as five bowlers to break the momentum but he failed until Gayle was caught by David Miller on a delivery bowled by Axar Patel in the 11th over of the game. RCB score was already 147 by then.

AB de Villiers came but he got bowled for a duck in the 12th over. K.L. Rahul joined Kohli and he supported Kohli well as they both took the score to 199 for Bangalore. Kohli was caught by Miller off Sandeep Sharma ball in the 14th over.

Rahul and Kohli made a partnership of 45-run in 15 balls. Rahul scored unbeaten 16 runs for Bangalore with Shane Watson (1) on the other side. At the end of the innings, Bangalore posted a challenging total of 211 runs with the loss of 3 wickets.

Chasing a huge target of 212 runs, Punjab struggled to make runs and ended up making 120 runs with the loss of 9 wickets in 14 overs and due to sudden rain umpires called off the match.

Punjab lost their wickets in a regular interval, other than Wriddhiman Saha, who scored 24 runs off 10 balls for Punjab none of the batsmen could past the mark of 20 runs.

After the third consecutive victory, RCB climbed up to the second position from the fifth position on the points table.

19 May 2016
Avni S. Singh