Ross Taylor steals the match from Knight Riders

Kolkatta Knight Riders Vs Banglore Royal Challengers - Match 41 - SuperSport Park, Centurion

Kolkatta Knight Riders did it again, Yes Kolkatta lost yet another game and this time it was a game which they should have won against the Royal Challenegers Banglore. Having dominated the game for more than 30 overs, Kolkatta lost the plot in the final overs and Ross Taylor's heroic landed a much needed victory for the Royal Challengers. Kolkatta didn't have the greatest of starts after being put in by Banglore Royal Challengers loosing the wickets of Sourav Ganguly(4) and A Ghosh(7) early in the innings. But McCullum played a captains innings and along with David Hussey smashed the Royal challengers bowling. McCullum scored an unbeaten 84 of 64 deliveries, an innings which included 10 fours and two massive sixers. David Hussey scored 43 from 27 balls and these two innings propelled Kolkatta to their highest total in this season of IPL 173.

Chasing 174 for victory Challengers made a steady start adding 58 runs for the first wicket in 8 overs. But a Triple blow in the form of wickets of Kallis(31), Ryder(22) and Uthappa(7) reduced Banglore to 74/3. But Ross Taylor who started off slowly and played one of the most explosive innings of this IPL changed the fate of Banglore Royal Challengers. Imagine an innings where a bataman scores 81 runs with a strike rate of 245! That was exactly what Taylor did. He sent the Kolkatta bowlers leather hunting and reduced the asking rate from somewhere around 14 runs per over to just 5 runs of the last over. Ross Taylor's innings included seven four's and five sixers. A beautiful innings from McCullum was completely overshadowed by Taylor and kept alive the semi-final hopes of Banglore Royal Challengers.

Toss

Banglore Royal Challengers won the toss and chose to field

Brief Scores

Kolkatta Knight Riders - 173/4 in 20 overs (B McCullum - 84*, D Hussey - 43, R Vinay Kumar - 2/33, A Kumble - 1/28)

Royal Challengers Banglore - 176/4 in 19.2 overs(Ross Taylor - 81*, J Kallis - 31, M Karthik - 2/28, A Mendis - 1/21)

Result

Banglore Royal Challengers won the match by 6 wickets