Royal Challengers Bangalore hosted Chennai Super Kings in the 39th match of IPL 2019 at Chinnaswamy Stadium on Sunday (April 21).
After being put into bat, RCB lost the key wicket of Virat Kohli (9) in the third over off Deepak Chahar. AB de Villiers and Parthiv Patel then added 47 runs for the second wicket. De Villiers was looking set for a big one before Ravindra Jadeja removed him for 19-ball 25. Parthiv then partnered with Akshdeep Nath to add another 41 runs for the third wicket. Nath departed for a promising 24 off 20 balls. Meanwhile, Parthiv completed his second fifty (53 off 37 balls) of IPL 2019 before being dismissed by Dwayne Bravo. Later, Moeen Ali's 26 off 16 balls (5 boundaries) enabled RCB to post 161/7 in 20 overs. For CSK, Deepak Chahar, Ravindra Jadeja and Dwayne Bravo claimed two wickets apiece.
Defending the total, Dale Steyn and Umesh Yadav wreaked havoc on CSK’s batting line-up. Both the pacers dismissed two batsmen each to reduce Chennai to 28/4 inside the powerplay. While Steyn removed Shane Watson (5) and Suresh Raina (0) in successive deliveries of the very first over, Umesh got rid of Faf du Plessis (5) and Kedar Jadhav (9).
Ambati Rayudu and MS Dhoni added 55 runs for the fifth wicket to steady the sheep but the duo couldn’t bring the required run-rate down. Yuzvendra Chahal broke the partnership by removing Rayudu for 29. Afterwards, the pair of Ravindra Jadeja and Dhoni 25 runs before the former got run out for 11. Needing 54 off 20 balls, Bravo joined Dhoni at the crease. The duo accumulated 13 runs from the 18th over off Steyn while they amassed 10 runs from the penultimate over off Navdeep Saini.
Bravo got out in the final delivery of the 19th over which left CSK requiring 26 from the last over. MS Dhoni then turned back the clock and smashed Umesh Yadav for 4, 6, 6, 2 and 6 to put Chennai on the brink of the victory. However, the CSK skipper failed to connect the last ball as Parthiv Patel’s direct-hit ran Shardul Thakur out and sealed the victory for RCB by just 1 run.
Cricket experts on Twitter were left speechless by Dhoni’s jaw-dropping 48-ball 84* despite RCB’s victory over CSK.
Here are some of the reactions:
