Royal Challengers Bengaluru failed to pull off a victory at the Chinnaswamy Stadium yet again on Friday. They have now lost all three matches at their home ground.
Josh Hazlewood’s 3/14 wasn’t enough as Punjab Kings rode Nehal Wadhera’s 33 off 19 balls to reach the 96-run target with 11 balls remaining.
The 14-over rain-shortened contest was always going to be tricky and RCB paid the price for poor batting by their top order.
Three of RCB’s first five wickets fell with batters trying to pull. Then there was one who tried to slash over point and was caught. The Kings too lost their openers to cross-bat shots.
Prabhsimaran Singh departed in an effort to go over the top with Tim David completing a high catch.
Hazlewood’s height and release point made it tough for the batters to play the flat-
batted shots against him. Punjab made the mistake and paid the price.
Priyansh Arya went for an ambitious stroke and holed out to mid-off. He had top-edged a pull earlier in the over which went for a six.
Hazlewood then took two wickets in the eighth over. First, he beat Shreyas Iyer both in pace and bounce as the slash outside the off stump was held nicely by Jitesh Sharma. Then Josh Inglis attempted a similar slash and was taken at deep third man by Suyash Sharma.
But Wadhera stayed put till the end to give the Kings another exciting win.
Earlier, David’s 50 off 26 balls gave the RCB total some respectability after they
were tottering at 42/7 in the ninth over.
RCB’s troubles started in the first over itself when Arshdeep Singh needed just four balls to remove Phil Salt. The left-arm pacer pulled his length back to induce a top-edged pull and then delivered another knockout blow in
his next over by dismissing Virat Kohli.
Kohli had come down the wicket and Arshdeep reacted by digging the ball in short and angling it away. Kohli decided to complete the pre-meditated pull but Marco Jansen running back from mid-on completed the catch.
RCB suffered another blow in the four-over Powerplay as Liam Livingstone was claimed by Xavier Barlett.
It was then the turn of Yuzvendra Chahal, who had run through KKR in their earlier match, to carry on his
wicket-taking ways. The RCB batters were desperate for
big hits and it made Chahal’s task easier.
He first sent back Jitesh and then Rajat Patidar. It was only because of David that RCB reached 95.