Sehwag’s knock in vain, RCB knock Daredevils out of CLT20
Bengaluru, Oct 19: Virender Sehwag’s blistering 47 gave Delhi a strong start but the hosts Royal Challengers Bangalore fought back even more strongly to first restrict the Daredevils to 138 for 6 and then got to the target with almost five overs to spare.
The defeat meant Delhi Daredevils were out of the tournament and it also signaled the exit of all three Indian teams from the semi-finals.
From Daredevils’ group, the teams making the last four are Victoria Bushrangers and Cape Cobras, though Delhi still have to play the latter on October 19. Both Victoria and Cobras have four points each, but Victoria have finished their engagements, while Cobras still have one game in hand. Royal Challengers finished with two points, while Delhi have none but one game to play.
Sehwag began his innings in a typical aggressive style with four fours from his six deliveries as Delhi were 19 for no loss in just two overs. He hit 47 from 29 balls to help Delhi to 77 for 1 after nine overs. But once he left the batting collapsed and Daredevils managed only 61 in the next 11 while losing five wickets. For Bangalore spinners Anil Kumble and Roelof van der Merwe did the damage.
As the batting track slowed down, so did Delhi’s scoring rate. Once van der Merwe had Sehwag holing out at long-off, Delhi started crumbling. Kumble, celebrating his 39th birthday, dismissed Dinesh Karthik with his third ball. Tillakaratne Dilshan attempted his trademark scoop but ended top-edging a return catch to Kumble.
Kumble restricted Delhi to a slow run-rate through the middle overs and picked 3 for 30, while van der Merwe finished with one for 17.
Bangalore were quite lax in the field as they dropped a catch and missed two run-outs in the first seven overs.
But it was Delhi who paid a bigger penalty as Ross Taylor was put down twice in consecutive overs. Taylor made good with a 38-ball 65 that sealed a win for his team.
Bangalore lost Manish Pandey to a muscle pull in the second over and Robin Uthappa went back after a miscued pull. Taylor smashed veteran Glenn McGrath for three fours in his opening over.
As Dirk Nannes turned in a good spell of one for 12 off three, Bangalore managed an unsatisfactory 35 from the Powerplay.
Ashish Nehra dropped Taylor on 18 and then Rajat Bhatia put down a stiff return catch at 32.
McGrath returned and was picked for two more fours, one finely edged and the other pulled powerfully, and then Amit Mishra was hit for successive sixes as he gave away 21 runs in that single over.
Taylor was bowled soon after by Nannes but by then the match was very much in Bangalore’s favour. Virat Kohli, with 31 needed from 41 balls helped finish it off with 29 balls remaining. Mishra's woeful day ended with four boundaries from Kohli in an 18-run 15th over.
Dravid completed the proceedings with a six off Nehra as Bangalore scored 104 in their last nine overs and won by eight wickets.
