Cricket: "IPL 2011 Match No 24: Kolkata Knight Riders v Royal Challengers Bangalore"

Welcome to Match No 24 of 2011 IPL between Kolkata Knight Riders and Royal challengers Bangalore. Kolkata knight riders are on a high after their back to back wins and other side Royal chanllengers Bangalore are a little down with the recent losses. Chris Gayle's purchase has bring some hope and strongness to royal challengers bangalore.

Royal challengers bangalore won the toss and Daniel Vettori, Royal challengers bangalore captain elected to field first. Haddin and Kallis gave a good start to kolkatta knight riders scoring 10 an over. Once Haddin was out caught at point Gambhir, captain of Kolkatta Knight Riders came in to the middle and didnt let the momentum down. He and Kallis play really well to get to Kolkatta Knight riders score past 100. Once Gambhir and Kallis were gone, Yousuf pathan stepped up and for the first time in 2011 ipl showed his much anticipated hitting with three fours and three sixes. With that late blitz Kolkatta Knight Riders scored a decent yet defendable score of 171. For Kolkatta Knight riders Kallis (40), Gambhir(48), yousuf(46) where the contributers, where as for Royal Challengers Bangalore S Aravind took two wickets.

Dilshan and Chris Gayle opened the batting for Royal Challengers Bangalore. Right from the word go Chris Gayle blasted the Kolkatta Knight Riders bowling. Dilshan too joined the party later on but was overshadowed by the giant's giant innings. Royal challengers banglaore had their first and last success when Dilshan was out bowled to Balaji for 38. Kohli came after the fall of dilshan and Gayle completed his century of 55 balls and showed all the IPL franchises lesson for ignoring him during the auction. Gayle innings was brutal, he scored 102 of 55 balls with 10 fours and 7 sixes. All of a sudden royal challengers bangalore batting had become strong. Bangalore won safely under Gayles century.

Man of the match was Royal Challengers Bangalore's Chris Gayle for his Superb Century.

Score: Royal Challengers Bangalore 175 for 1 (Gayle 102*,Dilshan 38, Balaji 1-43) beat Kolkata Knight Riders 171 for 5 (Gambhir 48, Yousuf 46, Aravind 2-37 ) by nine wickets

Cricket: "Daring Yousuf snatches victory from Delhi Daredevils"

Match No 18: Delhi Daredevils Vs Rajasthan Royals

Yousuf Pathan big hitting addes two points to Rajasthan Roayls. Rajasthan royals had an emphatic win against Delhi Daredevils when they defeated them by 5 wickets at superport park, Centurion.

Delhi Daredevils won the toss and elected to bat first. Delhi lost Gambhir(8) and Sehwag(16) in the third over with score reading 25 for 2 of 3 overs. Soon dilshan and karthik followed them of patel and warne respectively and the score was reading 4 for 49 of 7.2 overs. Then DeVilliers had a crucial partnership of 56 runs and steadied the innings. AB deVilliers scored 50 of 40 balls with 5 fours and 1 six and vettori 29 of 28 balls with 3 fours. late florish from manhas 23 from of 16 balls helped delhi scored a reasonable 143 of 20 overs. For Rajasthan Mascarenhas, patel and warne chipping in with 2 wickets a piece.

Rajasthan Royals followed the same mistake which they incurred in their previous matches and lost wickets at regular intervals and they were 64 for 5 of 11 overs. But they still had hopes with super captaincy from Warne. He didnt send yousuf before and kept him for the lat charge and it really helped Rajasthan. Other side Smith was playing a patient innings and kept one end intact. Once pathan came to the crease he gave a damm to the situation and played his natural game. he scored a sensational and un defeated 62 of 30 balls with 3 fours and 6 sixes and smith scored a patient undefeated 44 of 46 balls with 5 fours. They shared a unbroken partnership of 83 runs of just 45 balls. Rajasthan royals have beaten the Delhi Daredevils with 5 wickets.

Man of the Matchwas awarded to YK Pathan for his entertaining and daring innings of 62 from 30 balls with 3 fours and 6 huge sixes.

Scores: Rajasthan Royals 147 for 5 (Pathan 62*, Smith 44*, Mishra 3-34) beat Delhi Daredevils 143 for 7 (de Villiers 50, Vettori 29, Munaf 2-14, Mascarenhas 2-28) by five wickets

Cricket: "Yousuf Pathan Steals Rajasthan a thriller with super over"

Hey let me ask you one question did you thought that the match between Chennai Super Kings and Delhi Dare Devils was the best match till date?... If that was the best match then the match between Rajasthan Royals and Kolkata Knight Riders at Newlands, Cape Town was the mother of best matches. Yeah i am not kidding just read on......

It is indeed the best match of this IPL season and first tie. Yousuf Pathan showed why Rajasthan Royals are the defending champions. It was one of the elctrifying, thriller, call it what ever you want... but this was the most astonishing match of the tournment.

Kolkatta Knight Riders won the toss and elected to field first. They complimented their call with two early wickets with not much on the board. Score was reading 14 for 2 of 2.2 overs and Yousuf pathan came to crease. He didnt bother about the wickets and continued his natural game and took score to 70 for 2 of 8 overs. Yousuf scored 42 of 21 with 6 boundaries and 2 over it. Thats when disastor stuck rajasthan. Mendis was introduced in 9th over and he striked twice in that over to remove smith and pathan and rajasthan fell apart. Jadeja and Mascarenhas consolidated with some slow partnership and Raut chipped in which a quick fire 21 at end which included 1 boundary and 2 over it. Rajasthan made a below par 150 of their stipulated 20 overs.

Kolkatta started rather cautiously and with McCullum playing slowly against his attacking instincts where as gayle was at his fluent best scoring heavily. Rajsathan had the first blood in the form of Mccullum. Mascarenhas removed him for 3 of 9 balls and score was reading 25 for 1 of 4 overs. Gayle scored a quick fire 41 of 33 balls which included 2 boundaries and 4 over it. Once he departed of warne bowling Kolkata kept loosing wickets at regular intervals and the runrate was climbing up. Once Ganguly came to crease he made sure that Kolkata were in hunt till the end. Ganguly and Yashpal added 49 runs for the 6th wicket before yashpal was foxed by captain warne in the penultimate over. Kolkatta required 7 of last 6 balls and ball was handed over to kamran khan. Warne showed immense faith in this yound lad by handing over the ball to him to finish the game. He kept his captains faith with a tight line and lenght. He even even took the wicket of ganguly of the penultimate ball and made sure that kolkatta didnt won and the game was tied.

According to the new rules if their is a tie each team should play a super over. Which ever team scores more runs will win the match. Kolkatta had to bat first and they choosed Gayle, McCullum and Ganguly as their batsmen and the bowler for super over for Rajasthan was the man with golden arm for the day "Kamran Khan". For Rajsthan Yousuf Pathan, Jadeja and Warne will bat where as Mendis will bowl the super over for Kolkatta.

Kamran started of well but gave three consecutive boundaries to gayle and kolkatta managed a good 15 of their alloted one super over. Yousuf pathan came into bat the super over for rajasthan royals and mendis was to bowl for kolkatta. Mendis first ball was easily lofted to long on for an easy six and next ball was pulled ferociously for another six and tried for a hattrick with 3rd ball but couldnt connect the ball well and collected 2 runs and next ball was hammered for 4 and yousuf pathan sealed the match in just 4 balls. It was an nail bitting finish to a pulsating match.

Man of the Match was awarded to Yousuf Pathan for his 42 of 21 balls and electrifying 18 of super over to win the match. It was a perfect and Unanimous decision to make.

Kolkata Knight Riders 150 for 8 (Ganguly 46, Gayle 41, Kamran 3-18) tied with Rajasthan Royals 150 for 6 (Yusuf 42, Mendis 2-19). Rajasthan win in Super Over