Royal Challengers Bangalore players and support staff celebrate their thrilling win over the Redbacks, in Bangalore, on Wednesday. (AP)

Bangalore: KB Arun Karthik did a Javed Miandad at the Chinnaswamy, on Wednesday!

In an exciting finish, the Tamil Nadu batsman turned out to be the hero for the Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB). With six runs required off the last ball for a victory, Karthik hit South Australian Redbacks’ Daniel Christian over the midwicket boundary to give his team a thrilling two-wicket victory.

The act rekindled memories of Miandad’s heroics, against India, in the final of the Austral-Asia Cup, in 1986. In that match, at Sharjah, Pakistan needed four runs off the last ball for a victory and Miandad hit Chetan Sharma for an over boundary.

And like Miandad gave Pakistan the trophy, Karthik’s feat clinched a CLT20 semi-final berth for his team. RCB booked a semis date with New South Wales, in Chennai, on Saturday.

But RCB’s triumph also turned out to be Kolkata Knight Riders’ tragedy. After Somerset had defeated the Warriors in Wednesday’s first Group B match to qualify for the semi-finals, the RCB-Redbacks match became crucial for the Knights’ chances. A win for the Redbacks would have shut the door on the Knights, while RCB’s victory would have given them a chance.

RCB won, and they won brilliantly. With the victory, RCB were tied on points — 4 — with the Knights. The Warriors were also on the same number of points, but their inferior net run rate pushed them out of contention even before the RCB-Redbacks match began. So, it was basically the Knights vs RCB in the battle of net run rates.

And RCB prevailed with a net run rate of +0.325 as compared to the Knights’ +0.306.

Coming back to the breath-taking match, it was some superb batsmanship from Tillekaratne Dilshan and Man of the Match Virat Kohli, and Arun Karthik’s cool finishing that saw RCB through.

Chasing a formidable 215 for victory, RCB raced to 98 for one in 10 overs. Dilshan (74 off 47 balls) was in prime form hitting boundaries almost at will. But the real turning point of the RCB chase was the Kohli and Dilshan’s combined assault from the 11th to the 15th over of their innings. The Indo-Lankan duo plundered 67 runs in that period.

However, Shaun Tait’s pace almost put a late twist in the match. In the penultimate over of the RCB innings, Tait’s extra pace got the better of the RCB batsmen. In an excellent display of fast bowling, Tait scalped the wickets of Dilshan, Daniel Vettori and Raju Bhatkal in the 19th over and gave away just 4 runs.

But thanks to Arun Karthik, RCB had the last laugh.

Speaking at the post-match presentation ceremony, RCB captain Daniel Vettori summed up the match as “a pretty amazing game of cricket.”

The following are excerpts

Daniel Vettori: I think it was a pretty amazing game of cricket… The Redbacks had put up an incredibly tough score… One thing about the ground here is you can chase anything… The wicket gets better and better and the bounce is quite good and even… The ball travelled some distance as the batsmen from both the sides cashed in on the conditions. It was a beautiful game of cricket, played by two great teams.

There are always things which you can always improve on… I think we bowled really poorly in the last five overs.

It’s become a little bit of tradition for us… We are always lurking at the rock-bottom of the table and then fighting our way back to the top. We did it in the IPL… We did it here… Hopefully, now, we have picked up the momentum.

Callum Ferguson: Obviously, it was disappointing not to make the semis and not to defend 214. Daniel Harris did a fantastic job with the bat and got us in a winning position… Daniel Christian came in at the end and batted really well… We thought we had it… Shaun Tait came back and went bang bang bang… But then they were up to the task equally. It was a fantastic chase… Kohli and Dilshan batted beautifully…

We got to a score which we thought we would be able to defend… Disappointed that we could not do that. RCB batted beautifully and got over the line.

Tait was absolutely fantastic… When RCB were looking threatening, he brought us back in the game by snaring a few wickets… But we could not finish the job.

Virat Kohli: I think this game will be among one of the best I have played… This one will feature at the top of the table… I haven’t played such an exciting game in my life… I had my eyes closed before the last ball… I was talking to the coach… Maybe we can hit a four in the second last ball and take a two in the last ball… But Arun (Karthik) hit a six and it is a fantastic feeling now…

Arun Karthik: I knew that the ball might be a slower one so I just waited for it… Luckily it turned out to be a slower one… I gave it all that I had and hit hard.

I knew that 15 off the last over was achievable… It was possible to get those runs especially on this wicket. I am just happy that I hit the six… Thanks to all my team members who have supported me.