CHENNAI EXPRESS STEAMROLL RCB
Chennai Super Kings made a heavy weather of a small total before captain MS Dhoni did his famous finishing act to beat Royal Challengers Bangalore by six wickets and virtually seal their place in the IPL playoffs on Saturday, needing just one more win in five matches.
RCB, on the other hand, are virtually out of the race for the playoffs. They are currently on six points and have to win all their five remaining matches, which is a big ask for the off-colour unit. However, skipper Dhoni feels his side is yet to find out a death over specialist.
Speaking at the post-match presentation, the Chennai skipper said: “We were worried about the bowling department, in the last few games, there’s no one individual who has come up and owned that place, especially someone who can bowl in the death overs. “The good thing is we have a lot of all-rounders, we need to know who is our death bowling option going ahead, that’s what we are worried about. That’s the reason for so many changes in the team for every game,” Dhoni added.
Hailing left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja for his impressive figures of 3/18 in four overs against Bangalore, the Ranchi stumper said: “Jadeja bowled very well, he was maneuvering his pace, bowled with a flatter trajectory.”
The Chennai are sitting pretty on top of the table with 14 points from 10 matches. They have won seven of those matches while losing three. The Chennai team, which has a reputed batting line-up, were expected to acomplish the job quite easily. But the team put themselves under pressure in the slog overs before skipper Dhoni smashed three sixes off RCB’s star spinner Yuzvendra Chahal to take his side across the line in the 18th over.
Having elected to field first on winning the toss, CSK restricted the visitors to 127/9 in their 20 overs.
CSK were boosted by an excellent display by the hitherto off-colour Ravindra Jadeja who roared back to form with figures of 3/18.
Earlier, disciplined bowling by CSK and a few reckless shots by the RCB batsmen saw the visitors being restricted to a low total.
The highlight of the RCB batting effort was a half-century from opener Parthiv Patel, who was their highest scorer with 53 runs off 41 balls.
The only other RCB batsman to reach double figures was tailender Tim Southee who remained unbeaten on 36 off 26 balls.
RCB skipper Virat Kohli made a bold move by promoting himself up the order coming out to bat at the one-down slot. But his move did not pay off as Ravindra Jadeja struck a big blow with his first ball of the match when he bowled the RCB skipper with a delivery that turned in sharply after pitching.—