Finch, Raina add to Bangalore’s woes with 92-run stand

Royal Challengers Bangalore will be eyeing a big win when they meet Gujrat Lions in the 31st match of Vivo IPL 2017, today at M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bangalore.

Gujarat registered their third win of this season. The third spot is still retained by the defending champions Sunrisers Hyderabad followed by Rising Pune Supergiant who are now at the fourth spot.

Kedar Jadhav didnt waste time settling in, taking on Thampi, Ravindra Jadeja and legspinner Ankit Soni when he came into the attack but an attempted late cut against Jadeja ended in him being bowled for 31 (18b).

Only two – Kedar Jadhav and Pawan Negi – reached the thirties with impressive strike-rates.

GL moved to the sixth position with this victory whereas RCB are languishing at the seventh spot in the points table. Circa 2016 was a case in point, when Kohli had scored 973 runs in 16 matches. In 2016 they needed to win six of their last seven matches and all of their last four games to qualify and did it. He picked up two more boundaries before being trapped leg before by Badree in the 3rd over. AB de Villiers falls as Soni grabs his first wicket on his debut IPL match. But any plans of applying the choke thereafter were thwarted by a rampaging Aaron Finch.

Finch (72) signalled his intentional when he struck two sixes and as many boundaries in his first eight deliveries as Gujarat ended the powerplay at 49 for two.

Royal Challengers Bangalore’s batting in the 2017 IPL has hardly reinforced why they boast three of the five highest totals in IPL history. Nathu Singh and Basil Thampi got the ball to jag around a bit.

Bangalore kept losing the wickets and managed to score 134 in the 20 overs as the final wicket fell in on the last ball of the innings. Off the next ball, Travis Head, also a left-hander, offered an outside edge to Suresh Raina at first slip.

Gayle then nicked a Andrew Tye delivery straight to wicket-keeper Dinesh Karthik as RCB lost both their openers inside the powerplay. He finally departed in the 13th over after hitting six sixes and five fours.

However, Jadeja cleaned up Jadhav in the next over when the batsman dragged one on to his stumps as RCB slumped to 58 for 4 in 9 overs.

Badree (2-29) then had McCullum caught in the deep in his third to give further hope to RCB’s cause. Bowlers have in fact been doing better than batsmen, and the likes of Tymal Mills, S Aravind, Yuzvendra Chahal, Shane Watson need to pull something out of the bag to keep hopes of making the semifinals alive.

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