Virat Kohli called it the best T20 game he has played in and he wasn’t exaggerating by any stretch. Not when you have a match where a side amasses 214 in their 20 overs, that includes a centurion, and then possesses a bowler who scalps five wickets when they bowl, and yet, ends up on a losing side.
Royal Challengers Bangalore and South Australia had gone into the last league game of the Champions League T20 at the M Chinnaswamy, with the cognizance that the winner would enter the knockouts. The losing side on the other hand, had not even crumbs to eat – just a straight flight back home.
And so, when South Australia went on a rampage from as early as the second over, the Bangalore bowlers should have seen it coming. Probably they did, but were hapless against the bulldozing Daniel Harris and the hard, flat pitch. Captain Michael Klinger, who would later have to be hospitalised for an awful collision on the field, scored only seven in the 54-run opening stand. To make matters worse for Bangalore, it came off only five overs.
The dismissal of Klinger only brought the in-form Callum Ferguson to the crease and the way he played, it looked like a second century in the innings was in the offing. He made a 43-ball 70, his second such innings in the tournament, but by the time he was dismissed, the Redbacks were on their way to a total of 200. 46 runs came from the last 14 balls, including a nine-ball 27 from Daniel Christian that got them to more than just 200.
Harris’ knock was that of brute force coupled with gorgeous timing. In the last two games, played over successive days, Chris Gayle and Dave Warner have enthralled with their power-packed hitting. Harris’ innings had no less power, but he hit only two sixes in the innings to go with 17 boundaries – the most in an innings in this tournament. He remained unbeaten on 108 that came off 61 balls.
Bangalore’s reply was as stupendous as one would expect from a team that has a glittering line-up of batsmen. Much like the Redbacks, Gayle and T Dilshan went after the South Australian side from the word go, adding 65 for the first wicket in six overs. What helped Bangalore no ends was that it was not only Gayle who was doing the score, but T Dilshan found his lost ability to score runs as well.
Gayle departed for 26 as soon as the Powerplay overs were up, but Virat Kohli, in an innings punctuated with amazing timing, propelled the innings forward. The pair of Dilshan and Kohli added 100 for the second wicket, and at 165 for two in 15 overs, the target of 50 runs from the last five overs seemed quite achievable.
Then, Shaun Tait came back into the attack and tore the middle-order apart. Having conceded in the first over of the innings earlier, Tait grabbed five wickets in his three return overs, including that of Kohli and Dilshan. By the start of the start of the last over, Bangalore needed 14 to win the game, but were left with only three wickets remaining.
A single, a wicket and a boundary were the three events off the first three balls, before Dan Christian restricted the batsmen to only three runs off the last two balls. This meant that Arun Karthik, who had played only one ball before the last ball, needed to hit a six to get the win and a qualification.
And he did just that, to a short of good length ball from Christian! In the hindsight, a yorker would have been a much better option but Christian went for something in the middle of the pitch and the ball was sent sprawling over mid-wicket fence.
Bangalore will now play New South Wales Blues in the semi-final to be played at Bangalore.