Tillakaratne Dilshan (74) and Virat Kohli (70) guided Royal Challengers Bangalore to clinch a stunning two wickets victory over South Australia Redbacks in the pulsating encounters of Champions League Twenty20. The hero of the match was Arun Karthik who hit a colossal six on the last ball to seal the victory for the Challengers. Royal Challengers Bangalore will now face New South Wales in the semis at Bangalore.
Pacer Shaun Tait gave South Australia huge breakthrough towards the end as he removed Virat Kohli in their Champions League Twenty20 match against Royal Challengers at M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore. In the end, Redbacks bowlers have made a come back as they scalped three quick wickets in the span of 25 runs. Virat Kohli, who made quick-fire 70 off 36 balls, also added valuable second wicket 100 runs stand with Tillakaratne Dilshan to lead Royal Challengers run chase.
Kohli raced to his fifty in 28 balls with the help of five sixes and two fours while Dilshan reached to his half century in 31 balls. Redbacks’ Daniel Christian dismissed Chris Gayle to give Royal Challengers huge blow. Gayle smacked three huge sixes in his 26 runs innings that came in 15 balls. Chasing mammoth 215, RCB’s Tillakaratne Dilshan and Chris Gayle started aggressively as Indian outfit raced to fifty in 4.4 overs.
Earlier, electing to bat, the Australian outfit made a mockery of the hapless RCB bowlers to post the highest total in the tournament. The Redbacks have four points and need a victory to take the top slot. The last six overs produced 92 runs with Sreenath Aravind being hit for 69 runs in his four over spell. The manner in which the left-arm seamer was hit all over the park may seriously dent his chances of making it to the playing XI against England.
For the Australian side, the “Doctor was on call” as Harris (a qualified medical practitioner) was the star of the innings. The right hander took charge from the word go with his audacious strokes that stunned the RCB bowlers. His magnificent innings was laced with 17 hits to the fence and two sixes one of which was the one which helped him reach his maiden T20 ton. Ferguson was equally brilliant at the other end, scoring a 43-ball 70, studded with four boundaries and three sixes.
After losing skipper Michael Klinger (7), Harris joined hands with Ferguson as the second wicket pair stitched a belligerent century partnership of 114 runs coming off only 75 balls. Harris showed no respect to RCB’s left arm seamer Dirk Nannes, hitting him for four consecutive boundaries taking 18 runs in the process. He was particularly severe on Aravind, creaming 28 runs in two overs. For RCB, Syed Mohammad and Rajoo Bhatkal claimed a wicket apiece.
Somerset beat Warriors by 12 runs, enter CLT20 semifinals: Somerset made a remarkable fightback with a superb bowling show after Craig Kieswetter shone with the bat as they defeated Warriors by 12 runs to qualify for the semifinals in the Champions League Twenty20 on Wednesday. Electing to bat, Somerset scored 146 for four with opener Kieswetter carrying the bat with a gritty unbeaten 56 and the bowlers then came up with a disciplined display by coming back strongly after it looked like that match had gone out of their grasp.
Chasing 147 for a win, Warriors were comfortably placed at 71 for one at the halfway mark but some tight bowling and quick wickets saw the match tilting to Somerset’s favour. Warriors needed 37 from the last three overs with five wickets in hand but they could score just 24 runs to end at 134 for eight and hand Somerset a 12-run victory in the Pool B match at MA Chinnaswamy Stadium. For Somerset, captain Alfonso Thomas, Steve Kirby and Murali Kartik bagged two wickets apiece while Adam Dibble and Roelof van der Merwe chipped in with a wicket apiece.
With the win on Wednesday, Somerset collected five points from four matches and booked a berth in the semifinals from Pool B. Warriors, however, started their run chase on a strong note with openers Ashwell Prince and Jon-Jon Smuts finding the boundaries early on. Summarised scores: Royal Challengers Bangalore 215-8 (Dilshan 74, Kohli 70, Tait 5-32) beat South Australia Redbacks 214-2 (Harris 108*, Ferguson 70) by two wickets.
Somerset 146-4 (Kieswetter 56*, Botha 1-20) beat Warriors 134 for 8 (JJ Smuts 38, Thomas 2-16) by 12 runs.
