Batting slowdown costs Delhi Capitals, after their solid opening
Royal Challengers Bangalore 166 for 3 (Bharat 78*, Maxwell 51, Nortje 2-24) beat Delhi Capitals 164 for 5 (Shaw 48, Dhawan 43, Siraj 2-25) by seven wickets
What was essentially a dead rubber looked like slipping away from Royal Challengers Bangalore at 55 for 3 halfway into a chase of 165 against Delhi Capitals. But then two catches slipped through the hands of Shreyas Iyer and R Ashwin, and Glenn Maxwell made the most of the lives to set the scene for a blockbuster finish from KS Bharat.
It was still anybody’s game when Royal Challengers needed 19 off 12 balls. Anrich Nortje, who had taken out both Virat Kohli and Devdutt Padikkal in his first two overs, stepped up once again, bowling a four-run penultimate over to leave Royal Challengers needing 15 off the final over, bowled by Avesh Khan.
Maxwell found the boundary off the first ball and followed it with a double to notch up his fourth half-century in his last five innings. The third ball was a terrific inswinging yorker which smashed Maxwell’s boot, but he survived again because this had pitched outside leg stump. A leg-bye put Bharat on strike and the next ball was a swing and a miss. Two of the penultimate ball, thanks to a misfield from Axar Patel in the outfield, eventually left Royal Challengers needing six off the last ball. Avesh went searching for another leg-stump yorker, but ended up bowling a full-toss down the leg side for a wide.
Avesh whisked short fine leg back for the last ball and went for another yorker, but it came out as a full-toss again, this time on the stumps. Bharat lined it up and shanked it over long-on to provide a throwback to Arun Karthik’s last-ball six for Royal Challengers in the Champions League T20 almost a decade ago.
Perhaps if Royal Challengers had batted first and adopted a no-holds barred batting approach like Mumbai Indians had done in Abu Dhabi, their slimmest of chances of making the top two might have stayed alive a tad longer. Match practice and fine-tuning aside, the game was dead from the moment they decided to bowl. Next, they will next run into Kolkata Knight Riders in the eliminator, while Capitals will face Chennai Super Kings in the first qualifier.
Full report to follow
Deivarayan Muthu is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
Source: ESPN Crickinfo