Royal Challengers Bangalore beat Sunrisers Hyderabad by 14 runs

The Indian Premier League (IPL) witnessed one of the best matches in its history when Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) clashed at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on Thursday. It was one heck of a game as the champions players put their hands up for their respective teams and a high-class entertainment was on show for the jam-packed crowd. However, it was the home side which prevailed in the thriller and won the game by 14 runs to stay alive in the tournament.

After losing the toss, Virat Kohli and Parthiv Patel were dismissed early but very few knew what was going to come later. AB de Villiers was in the flow as he just went berserk from the word go to slam a fifty off just 32 balls. He got an able partner in Moeen Ali who finally came to the party with the bat and smashed the ball to all the parts of the ground to score a 25-ball half-century. The heroic partnership between them was followed by a crazy period of hitting by Colin de Grandhomme and Sarfaraz Khan.

While the former hammered 40 runs off just 17 deliveries, Sarfaraz smashed a quickfire 22 off 8 cherries which came his way. RCB posted a gigantic total of 218 runs for the loss of 6 wickets after 20 overs. The chase was, however, completely on with the way the openers of the Sunrisers started hitting the ball. They added 47 runs for the first wicket and then the mantle was taken over by Kane Williamson. Meanwhile, De Villiers turned into a Superman to take a wonderful and jaw-dropping catch of Alex Hales at the deep mid-wicket who was looking dangerous.

But the skipper of the Orange Army was high-class today who single-handedly kept them in the chase until the 14th over. His partner Manish Pandey the came to the party with his T20 pyrotechnics. Both made it look so simple and the equation was brought down to 35 off the last two overs. Once again, it was the duo of Tim Southee and Mohammed Siraj who defended the runs and only conceded 20. It was the latter who gave away only 5 runs in the last over to keep the hopes of the playoffs qualification alive for RCB.

Brief scores

Royal Challengers Bangalore 218 for 6 in 20 overs [AB de Villiers 69 (39), Moeen Ali 65 (34), Colin de Grandhomme 40 (17), Sarfraz Khan 22 (8)*; Rashid Khan 4-0-27-3] beat Sunrisers Hyderabad 204 for 3 in 20 overs [Alex Hales 37 (24), Kane Williamson 81 (42)*, Manish Pandey 62 (38)*; Yuzvendra Chahal 4-0-28-1] by 14 runs.

Player of the Match: AB de Villiers.