Chennai Super Kings and their fans finally had something to cheer about as the yellow brigade tamed Virat Kohli’s Royal Challengers Bangalore by 8 wickets at the Dubai International Stadium. Everything finally fell into place as the youngster in Ruturaj Gaikwad finally showed some spark in batting, taking the MS Dhoni-led team home.
Forced to field first, Chennai did well with their pacers Sam Curran and Deepak Chahar and fresh spin inclusion Mitchell Santner to stop the Challengers at a modest 145. After that, the resolve and intent were seen right from the start in the batting as well, when opener Gaikwad made well-combined partnerships with Faf du Plessis and Ambati Rayudu and later on with skipper Dhoni to seal the game.
There were many that contributed to the victory for CSK and many that did not perform as per expectation for the RCB. To know them and their batting performances better, here is the list of hits and flops from the game.
Before the start of the tournament, Gaikwad was primed to be the successor of Suresh Raina in the team. However, situations did not help in the initial phase as he tested positive for the covid-19 and later when he got the opportunities, wasn’t given the top spot, which he usually bats at for his team Maharashtra.
Given a chance to open the innings, he finally made it count in the second attempt, scoring a match-winning 65 off 51 and more importantly carried his bat. In his innings, Gaikwad had three good partnerships alongside experienced players like du Plessis, Ambati Rayudu, and Dhoni. He hit four boundaries three sixes in the innings.
The player, who has been performing for the Daddies’ Army even with others faltering, performed today as well. The Englishman picked three crucial wickets including that of opponent skipper Virat Kohli and Aaron Finch. His spell at the beginning turned out to be an important one as he did not allow RCB to build momentum. The left-arm bowler, who had till now picked 10 wickets in the IPL, added three more to the tally today as he finished with the figures of 3/19.
Not being able to contribute much with the ball in the last few games, Chahar, who primarily was bowled out at the start of the inning was given a chance to bowl in the death and he responded brilliantly by picking up two wickets and that too of two of the danger men, AB de Villiers and Chris Morris.
The wicket of de Villiers in particular was the game-changing one for CSK as it brought the RCB total down by 30-35 runs.
This IPL has not gone the way Australian limited-overs captain Aaron Finch would have wanted. Apart from two innings- one 47 off 37 against KKR and 52 of 35 against Mumbai Indians, Finch has not been able to contribute greatly to the RCB cause.
Even today, he did not look his best and was thus removed by Sam Curran early on in the RCB innings at just 15 off 11 balls.
Moeen Ali was given a chance in place of Isuru Udana but he failed to impress anybody getting out for just one in the 18th over, where people expected him to go berserk. Ali couldn't do much with the ball in hand either.
This might just turn out to be the last game of the IPL for Ali as Udana world be preferred in his place.
While Chennai have nothing more to achieve rather than the lost respect, but RCB would look to tighten the nuts moving forward in the tournament.
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