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

Banglore Royal Challengers Vs Kolkatta Knight Riders - Match 19 - Kingsmead, Durban - Bulletin

A sensational last over victory handed Banglore a much needed victory ending their four match loosing streak. Needing just 140 for victory Banglore started off their chase solidly with a 69 run first wicket partnership. Incidentally this was their first 50+ first wicket partnership for the tournament. Goswami who had replaced Uthappa at the top order played sensibly scoring 43 off 46 balls. But the Kolkatta bowling led by Hodge and Ishant made quick inroads into the Banglore batting line up. Banglore needed 10 runs of the final over with the scoreboard reading 129/5. The experienced Boucher, held his nerve and guided Banglore home. Gayle gave 1,4,2,2,4 in the crucial final over.

Earlier in the day Kolkatta started off disastrously with McCullum falling yet again for a first ball duck. McCullums form, rather loss of it is a big worry for Kolkatta and this can prove to be a decisive factor in the games to come. C Gayle once again proved his worth with solid 40 off 37 balls, but the unexpected star for Kolkatta came in the form of M Van Myk who remained unbeaten for a solid 43 of 35 balls. L Shukla's 21 of 15 balls helped add respectably to the Kolkatta score and they ended up scoring 139 runs at the end of their 20 over quota.

Toss:
Kolkatta Knight Riders won the toss and elected to field.

Teams:
Kolkatta Knight Riders
C Gayle, B McCullum, S Ganguly, B Hodge, WP Saha, LR Shukla, M Van Myk, A Agarkar,
M Karthik, I Sharma, A Dinda
Banglore Royal Challengers
J Kallis, S Goswami, K Pieterson, M Boucher, Van der Merwe, V Kohli, M Pandey, P Kumar, Pankaj Singh, KP Appanna, A Kumble

Brief Scores:
Kolkatta Knight Riders - 139/6 in 20 overs(Van Wyk - 43*, C Gayle - 40, A Kumble - 2/16,
K Pieterson - 1/24)
Banglore Royal Challengers - 143/5 in 19.5 overs(S Goswami - 43, M Boucher - 25*,
B Hodge - 3/29, I Sharma - 2/15)

Result:
Banglore Royal Challengers won the match by 5 wickets