Xtra Time Web Desk: Finisher Dinesh Karthik finishes off in style at the MA Chinnaswamy stadium, Bengaluru. Royal Challengers Bengaluru takes on Punjab Kings in the match 6 of IPL 2024. Both were looking for their first win of the season. RCB captain Faf Du Plesis won the toss and chose to ball first at their home ground.
Batting first, the Punjab Kings made 176/6, the batters started slow but steady. PBKS captain Shikhar Dhawan (45) and Prabhsimran Singh (25) respected the good balls, punished the lose ones. Team reached their 50 at the end of the sixth over. Alzarri Joseph gets the big wicket for his team. Length ball does the trick, removes the dangerous Liam Livingstone (17). Kings lost two wickets in two consecutive deliveries, when the Kings looked settle. Glenn Maxwell strikes in his very first delivery of his 2nd over, removes the opposition captain, Virat Kohli takes an easy catch at long on. Both Sam Curran and Jitesh Sharma steadied the ship and added few crucial runs. Shashank Singh made a blistering 21 off 8 deliveries.
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Second innings witnessed a Virat Kohli masterclass. The chase master anchored the ship an got his team across the line. Made match winning 77 of 49 deliveries including two 6s and eleven 4s. Scored his 51st half century of his IPL career. After scoring a quiet 21 runs at Chennai in a losing cause in IPL 2024 opener, Kohli made a much noisier 77 off 49 balls to fire Bengaluru’s chase. Unfortunately, didn’t get much help from the next batters. Maxwell, Patidar, Rawat all fell cheaply. Tension arose again when Kohli got out. But Dinesh Karthik (28 off 10) and Mahipal Lomlor (17 off 8) did the finishing job for their team. Yet again Dinesh Karthik proves why he is known as the “finisher of RCB. This game like other games, also came down to the last ball, but the batters managed to hold nerves and got their team home.
Royal Challengers Bangaluru will be pumped with their first win when they next meet Kolkata Knight Riders on 29 April at their home again. Both the teams would be hoping continue their winning streak.
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