Chennai Super Kings beat Royal Challengers Bangalore by six wickets to reach IPL 4 final as Suresh Raina hit an unbeaten 50-ball 73 at Wankhede stadium in Mumbai on Tuesday.
Chennai chased down the 176-run target in 19.4 overs as Raina and Albie Morkel put up a 46-run stand off 18 balls. Raina’s unbeaten knock was studded with 6 sixes and 4 fours and Morkel hit 3 sixes and a four in his 10-ball 28. Zaheer Khan had Chennai captain MS Dhoni caught by Abhimanyu Mithun at long-on soon after Suresh Raina hit a 41-ball fifty.
Dhoni hit a six and 3 fours in his 19-ball 29 before falling to Zaheer. Raina and Dhoni added 61 runs for the fourth wicket after Abhimanyu Mithun had Subramaniam Badrinath caught by Sreenath Aravind at sweeper cover. Badrinath hit 5 fours in his 32-ball 34 and added 63 runs for the third wicket with Raina before falling to Mithun.
Chennai’s run chase got off to a bad start as Zaheer Khan and Sreenath Aravind dismissed their openers in the first two overs.
Zaheer struck first when he trapped Michael Hussey plumb in front of the wicket on the fourth ball of the Chennai innings for a duck. Aravind then dismissed Murali Vijay leg before wicket in the second over to place Chennai to 7/2. Earlier, Virat Kohli hit an unbeaten 44-ball 70 to power Bangalore to 175/4 against Chennai.
Kohli’s unbeaten knock was studded with 3 sixes and 5 fours and he put a 48-run stand with Luke Pomersbach to lead Bangalore’s recovery. Pomersbach hit 2 sixes and 2 fours in his 18-ball 29 before he was clean bowled by a slower delivery from Doug Bollinger.
Chennai had seized the advantage when Shadab Jakati had AB de Villiers caught by Murali Vijay at long-on. de Villiers hit a six in his 10-ball 11 before losing his wicket.
Dwayne Bravo had Mayank Agarwal caught by Doug Bollinger at long-on to place Bangalore at 65/2 in 9 overs.
Mayank hit 5 fours in his 33-ball 34 before falling to Bravo. Ravichandran Ashwin gave Chennai an early breakthrough when he trapped the dangerous Chris Gayle plumb in front of the wicket.
Ashwin struck immediately after getting hit for a six. Gayle hit a six in his 9-ball 8 before falling to Ashwin. The breakthrough came after Chennai captain MS Dhoni won the toss and chose to bowl. Both Chennai and Bangalore have the same playing eleven.
Summarised score: Chennai Super Kings 177 for 4 (Raina 73*) beat Royal Challengers Bangalore 175 (Kohli 70*, Bollinger 1-20) by six wickets.
