AB special dumps Royals from title race

It was a disappointing end to the Rajasthan Royals’ 2015 IPL campaign as they fell to a crushing 71-run defeat at the hands of a clinical Royal Challengers Bangalore at Pune.

Fifties from man-of-the-match AB de Villiers and Mandeep Singh pulled Bangalore out of an early mire batting first before a superb motley of bouncers and slower balls from Sreenath Aravind and Harshal Patel stifled Rajasthan in their challenging chase.

Mitchell Starc overcame what looked like a back spasm to finish off with figures of 1-22 from his four overs while David Wiese and Yuzvendra Chahal also picked up a couple of wickets to bowl Rajasthan out for 109.

None of the Royals batsmen, bar Ajinkya Rahane who made 42, passed 12, with what looked to be a dual-natured pitch getting the better of them. Failures for two of their senior-most batsmen, Australians Shane Watson and Steven Smith, exacerbated matters for Rajasthan and they never recovered from that, falling away in a heap by the end.

Not that Bangalore began too well either, having won the toss and deciding to bat first. In fact it was a tale of two different halves with the bat for them and even captain Virat Kohli admitted at one stage he was wondering whether he could have opted to field first.

Despite Chris Gayle and Kohli’s best efforts in the first, their timing wasn’t at its most fluent, the shots didn’t find gaps as consistently as they would like and the rate fell regularly after an initial Gayle outburst.

Bangalore went from 0-24 after three overs to 2-46 in seven and at the halfway stage had registered their worst-ever score in the competition at that point.

With both Gayle and Kohli dismissed as well, Rajasthan had reason to feel very pleased with their effort, and restricting their opponents to less than 150 looked well on the cards.

And it was Dhawal Kulkarni who was largely the man responsible. After Gayle had welcomed him with a four and a six in his very first over and in turn set the ball rolling for what looked like a gruesome assault, Kulkarni came back with a bang.

In his second over, he had Gayle charging at him but missing, in turn knocking his middle-stump out of the ground. And then in his next, Kulkarni sent back captain Kohli to one that seamed away from him and had him playing back to the bowler.

It was Mandeep Singh, who came in at the fall of Kohli’s wicket who set about changing the match's trajectory. At the other end was a struggling de Villiers, who was finding it tough to get going on the grassy Pune pitch, but the batting of Mandeep ensured the momentum was injected back into the Bangalore innings.

It started with a four and a six off Kulkarni, off the last two balls of his quota, and he quickly raced to 21 from just 14 with a couple of boundaries in the 12th over.

Ankit Sharma and Watson conceded only 12 from the next couple of overs, at which stage de Villiers was on a mere 17 off 21 while Mandeep had hared off to a 19-ball 28.

The 15th over, Ankit’s third, changed things around for Bangalore. Out of nowhere, de Villiers found his touch, slog-sweeping the left-arm spinner for a couple of sixes and then drilling one through extra-cover for a four to overtake Mandeep.

And then de Villiers took full control by hitting 13 from the 17th over from Watson and then peppering the fence with two sixes in the 18th. The first of those sixes also brought up de Villiers’ half-century from just 34 balls, the last 33 of those runs coming from 13.

De Villiers’ run-out ended their 113-run stand before Mandeep got to his fifty - his first of the season – and propelled Bangalore to 4-180 from their 20 overs. A massive 120 runs had come from their final 10 overs, including 86 from the last six.

Faulkner’s disappointing season continued, as he finished with figures of 0-42 from his four overs, having earlier even shared the new ball with Morris (1-42).

Only Kulkarni, who was earlier named in the Indian ODI squad to tour Bangladesh, was spared the blushes as he picked up a couple of wickets and conceded just 28 from his four. 

In reply, the Royals innings never seemed settled. The effect of scoring nine an over from the very start and an effective Bangalore strategy of digging the ball short at the batsmen rattled them early and they could never recover from it.

Watson, on the back of a match-winning century against the Knight Riders, hit a couple of fours to begin his innings but edged one behind.

Sanju Samson’s poor season finished with an eight-ball five, bounced out by Patel, while Smith made just 12 from 13 balls before holing out to deep cover. Smith had issues with his timing too and with the required-rate having nudged past the 10-run-an-over mark, he attempted a step-out and lofted shot that went straight to hands.

After that, it was a steady procession of wickets. Karun Nair made 12 and edged it to the keeper, while Rahane’s 39-ball struggle was ended by Chahal as he looked to take on the leggie.

With the game almost as good as over, the rest of the side caved in without fight, as they went from 3-79 to 109 all out in 19 overs.

Bangalore now take on Chennai on Friday at Super Kings’ skipper MS Dhoni’s hometown in Ranchi, with the winner earning the right to take on Mumbai in the final.