Tue, 26 Apr 2011 - IP Delhi vs IP Bangalore, IPL 2011, 30th Match - Bulletin

Bangalore emerge winners in a tight finish

Bangalore overcame a middle order collapse to chase down a target of 161 runs in a last over finish scoring their second game in a row. It was Saeed Mohammad’s 7-ball 13 including two boundaries in 18th over with their worth weight in gold and Daniel Vettori’s calm head that took visitors across the line.After losing Tilkeratne Dilshan in second ball of the innings, Virat Kohli and Chris Gayle blasted Delhi bowlers to race to 83 runs inside eight overs to take stuffing out of home team. It was Virat Kohli though who was in terrific form playing some gorgeous drives both sides of the wicket as his first seven run scoring strokes included six boundaries, four of them from Irfan Pathan.

Gayle didn’t get much of the strike in early overs but unleashed typical Gayle shots to 14-ball 26 while Kohli hit one of the prettiest half centuries of the tournament and it looked Delhi were out of the game.

With Gayle holed out to James Hopes, a brilliance in field came from Warner whose rocket direct hit from the deep mid-wicket to have AB de Villiers short of crease bringing Delhi back into game. Morne Morkel made things better for Delhi getting Kohli bowled of an inside edge and it was followed by another wicket with spinner Yogesh Nagar having Pujara holed out in the deep.

With 54 needed off 45 balls, skipper Vettori and Saurabh Tiwary were forced to a rebuilding mode for sometime but when it needed both got big shots away to prevent required run rate from going out of bounds.

Then another big moment came in 17th over when Morne Morkel removed Tiwary after batsmen hit him for big six and A Mithun who played nothing shot to make chase interesting.

Vettori’s experience and calm head and Syed’s late charge with the bat helped Bangalore to emerge winners in a nail-biting finish \which left home crowd stunned and Bangalore supporters going for wild celeberations.

Even though danger-man Virender Sehwag got off to a good start hitting a flurry of boundaries but shoddy running proved to be his undoing. Before that the explosive Delhi opening pair Sehwag and David Warner was separated thanks to a beautiful Zaheer Khan in-swinger having latter’s stumps disturbed. The home team’s Australian buy, Mathew Wade did nothing to end a string of dismal performances in the IPL.

Then came James Hopes, another Australian but with a different set of skills and temperament. He played a responsible innings to give Delhi something to defend while hitting the ropes seven times in his 54 run contribution. With wickets falling around him, Hopes in company of Venugopal Rao kept the scoreboard ticking by getting some important boundaries away.

Hopes favoured leg side to collect most of his boundary with Australian timing the ball beautifully when his teammates were struggled for the same. His partnership of 47 runs Rao who scored fluent 24 gave consolidation to the Delhi innings and laid a good platform for lower order to have a late charge.Vettori once again proved to be Bangalore’s best bowler bowled Rao when batsmen gave him the charge but left arm spinner held the ball back and he gave away only 25 runs in his 4 overs.

Once Hopes was gone for 43-ball 54, there were some useful cameos from Naman Ojha and Irfan Pathan to take score to 160 to set up a mouth-watering run chase.For Bangalore, Zaheer Khan was back in some sort of form troubling the batsmen with swing and subtle changes in pace and direction conceding only 27 runs.