Match Review of Kings XI Punjab vs. Royal Challengers Bangalore

Indian Premier League - Match review
Date : 17th May 2011 Match No. : 63
Teams : Kings XI Punjab vs. Royal Challengers Bangalore
Venue : HPCA Stadium, Dharamsala
Umpires : Asad Rauf & A M Saheba Third Umpire: S L Shastri
Toss : Kings XI Punjab

Playing XI

Kings XI Punjab Paul Valthaty Adam Gilchrist © Shaun Marsh David Hussey Dinesh Karthik Mandeep Singh A M Nayar R J Harris Piyush Chawla Parveen Kumar S J Srivastava

Royal Challengers Bangalore Chris Gyale S Tiwari Virat Kohli © A B de Villiers Asad Pathan Mohamad Kaif K Karthik J van der Wath A Mithun C K Langeveldt S Aravind

It was overcast in Dharamsala, the venue for the 63rd match of this IPL season between Kings XI Punjab and Royal Challengers Bangalore. There were expected to be thunderstorms and showers as well.

The Kings XI Punjab seems to have got back to their winning streak after winning last 3 consecutive matches. They were set to host the Red hot Challengers who are riding high with 7 back to back victories since the time Gyale has joined them. Looking at the table standings, Punjab were desperate for a win to inch forward towards the playoff berths, the Challengers on the other hand are now eyeing to seal the top 2 positions on the tally.

The pitch at Dharamsala as it played in the last match against the Daredevils, seems to be full of runs. A total of 160 plus was definitely on cards. Considering the weather forecast, team winning the toss should opt to field. Punjab skipper, Gilchrist after won the toss and decided to bat.

The Punjab innings was opened by the two regular openers, Gilchrist and Valthaty. The former has not been in the best of this forms this season, and was little tentative in his shots early on. He was more inclined to get his aggressive partner Valthaty on strike. The visitors got their 1st breakthrough in the form of Valthaty when the home side was at a total of 25 runs. There was a celebration in the Royal's camp, little did they know what was in store for them. The Kings XI were scored at a quite pace for the 1st six overs.

In the 7th over, Gilchrist suddenly changed the gears and started smashing all the Royal bowlers for boundaries and sixes. As Zaheer Khan was rested today, it made it easy for the Gilchrist and Marsh to take on Abhimanyu Mithun and S Aravind. Both these bowlers got hammered as the Punjab skipper charged down the track trying to crash every ball over the boundary rope.

At the middle of the innings, the home side was scoring at about 10 runs per over. At this stage the rain picked up and threatened to ruin the match, but fortunately it went off and the play was not interrupted.

The Royal's skipper tried his all rounder Chris Gyale with the ball but no luck as he was hit for two massive sixes. In the 10th over being bowled by Langeveldt, Gilchrist took the scoring rate to the next zooming level by hitting him for two 6's and as many boundaries. Marsh on the other end was enjoying the skipper's stunning innings. Soon he escalated the Challenger's woes by hitting Johan van der Wath three 6's and three 4's scoring 30 runs of the 15th over of the innings.

A worried Challenger's captain tried all his bowling options in various combinations but nothing seemed to be going right their way. Though rain stopped but the fours and sixes didn't. This 2nd wicket partnership turned out to be nightmare for the Challenger's. They both put up a 206 runs partnership, highest ever for any wicket in any IPL edition. Gilchrist got out to Langeveldt after scoring 106 from 55 balls with 8 fours and 9 sixes on the penultimate ball of the innings. Marsh contributed an unbeaten 79 from 49 balls with 7 fours and 5 sixes to the massive total of 232 runs posted by the Punjab team.

233 to win was always going to be a difficult run chase, but the Challengers knew that they had the Power man called Chris Gyale who can make it happen. With his explosive hitting powers he can take the team home. The innings was opened by Gyale and Tiwari. It was a disastrous start when their big man Gyale was taken out by Ryan Harris for a duck in the second over. Kohli was the next man on the crease. Soon he also fell victim to Harris after scoring just 11 runs. The Challengers were now two wickets down for 17 runs.

AB de Villiars came in to bat at no. 4. He stayed on the crease until the 13th over just to be a spectator to his fellow team mates losing their wickets at the other end. None of the middle order batsmen could stay and contribute to the chase towards the improbable total of 233 runs. The Punjab bowlers completely over-powered the batsmen not giving them any window to score. Harris and Chawla were the pick of the bowlers claiming 3 and 4 wickets respectively. De Villiars lost his wicket in the 13th over after scoring 34 runs of 27 deliveries. Once he got out on a team total of 89/7, the contest was as good as over. Wickets kept falling and they could not play their quota of 20 overs. The Challengers rambled along to 121 runs all out in the 17th over to lose by a huge margin of 111 runs to the home side. This once again goes to prove their huge dependence on Chris Gyale for winning matches for them.

Result: Kings XI Punjab won by 111 runs

The Awards

Man of the match
Adam Gilchrist for exhibiting a stunning innings of 106 runs

Maximum Sixes
Adam Gilchrist for hitting 9 sixes

Kingfisher Fair Play Award
Chennai Super Kings top the chart

Orange Cap (The leading run scorer)
Shaun Marsh, Kings XI Punjab.

Purple Cap (The leading wicket taker)
Lasith Mallinga- Mumbai Indians

Question of the day?
In the best of the forms, who is more devastating Adam Gilchrist or Chris Gyale?



Last Updated on 19 May 2011