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Kings XI Punjab announced their arrival in Pepsi IPL 2015 as they defeated the Mumbai Indians by 18 runs at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. After posting a commanding 177 batting first, KXIP decimated the hosts top-order through some relentless fast bowling, and fought off a late assault by Harbhajan Singh and J Suchith – to eventually restrict them to 159 for 7.

MI lost man-in-form Rohit Sharma to the second ball of the chase when Sandeep Sharma got one to move back in sharply and rap the MI skipper on the pads in front of the stumps. Aditya Tare attempted to force the pace but was outsmarted by Anureet Singh and spooned a catch to Murali Vijay at covers. Less than two overs later, Aaron Finch lost his stumps to compatriot Mitchell Johnson.

Reduced to 17 for 3 at the end of the first six overs, it was going to be a herculean task for MI to get back into the contest. Corey Anderson’s dismissal in the eighth over – with the score still 25 – made things that much more difficult. Kieron Pollard gave the MI fans hope briefly when he smashed a four and a six and scored a run-a-ball 20, before an attempt to find the boundary saw him hole out to long off.

Despite being reduced to 59 for 6, debutant J Suchith and Harbhajan Singh did not throw in the towel but instead attempted to enjoy themselves and entertained the crowd with a few big hits. Harbhajan took the lead, smashing the fastest half-century by a Mumbai Indians player in the IPL – off 19 balls; he hit six sixes and four boundaries in his 24-knock of 64. Suchith turned out to be an able aide, scoring 34 from 21 balls. The pair added their first 50 runs in 19 balls and consumed another 20 balls to add the next 50, in the process bringing up the second century partnership of the season. From 59 for 6, it was some effort from the two spin bowler to take their team to 159 for 7. Harbhajan Singh was dismissed off the penultimate delivery of the innings with his team still 19 runs away.

Kings XI Punjab were relentless with the ball. Sandeep Sharma seems to have made it a habit of striking early; he accounted for the MI captain with his second delivery and finished with outstanding figures of 4-1-12-1. Anureet Singh bowled two good overs before his figures were ruined by a late assault by Harbhajan Singh; he finished with figures of 4-0-41-2. Mitchell Johnson was breathing fire right through this spell and finished with figures of two for 23. Axar Patel too was impressive; the left-arm spinner chipped in with two wickets.

Earlier in the evening, on a sporting pitch at the Wankhede Stadium, KXIP were provided a blazing start by their opening pair of Murali Vijay and Virender Sehwag. While the former took the conservative route to score 35, the latter gave those in the stands plenty to cheer as he smashed the Mumbai Indians bowlers with disdain.

Sehwag opened his account with a crisp cover drive. The first three balls of the third over produced 14 runs; the first ball took the inside edge and raced to the boundary, the second ball just managed to clear the ropes at squareleg and the third delivery was cut past point to the boundary. Runs continued to come in a flurry from Sehwag’s blade as he raced to 36 from 18 balls before he stepped out to hit Harbhajan Singh – bowling his first over – into the stands, but miscued and was caught at long on. The opening pair had added 60 before being separated in the seventh over.

Glenn Maxwell provided debutant J Suchith his first IPL wicket after which Harbhajan Singh accounted for Vijay, who had accumulated 35 off 26 balls, in the eleventh over. David Miller wasn’t at his fluent best on the day, yet he and George Bailey, who walked out to bat at number five, added 46 runs in 5.1 overs before Miller edged a Lasith Malinga delivery to wicket-keeper Aditya Tare.

Bailey, who came in for criticism in the previous match, answered his critics in the best possible manner – by scoring runs. He walked out to bat in the eleventh over and batted through to the end of the innings, in the process registering his maiden IPL half-century. Bailey hit four boundaries and three sixes and finished with 61 runs against his name. KXIP finished their 20 overs at 177-5, having added 72 runs in the last seven overs.

Harbhajan Singh bowled beautifully and was the pick of the MI bowlers. On a surface which provided some bounce for the spinners, the MI off-spinner bowled at a very good pace, hit the right areas consistently, bowled his four overs for 20 runs and returned with the scalps of the two KXIP openers. Malinga and Suchith were the two other wicket-takers for the hosts.

RR won the toss & chose to field

DD made 3 changes from the match that lost to CSK by 1 run. Manoj Tiwary replaced CM Gautam, Angelo Mathews replaced Albie Morkel & Jaidev Unadkat replaced Domnic Joseph

so their squad looks like this:
Agarwal, Manoj Tiwary, Iyer, Duminy(c), Yuvraj Singh, Mathews, Jadhav(wk), Coulter-Nile, Amit Mishra, Tahir, Unadkat

RR named an unchanged squad from the match that trashed KXIP. so their squad looks like:
Rahane, Samson(wk), Nair, Steve Smith(c), Hooda, Binny, Faulknar, Morris, Southee, Tambe, Kulkarni

DD 184/3(20 overs)Duminy 44*, Iyer 40, Morris 2-35, Tambe 1-18
RR 186/7(20 overs)Hooda 54, Rahane 47, Tahir 4-28, Mishra 2-32

They say “winning is a habit”. And the Delhi Daredevils certainly don’t seem to have imbibe that habit. Despite posting a challenging 184 runs on the board, they couldn’t prevent their opponents Rajasthan Royals from scoring the one run more that gave them two points from the match. By virtue of their 3-wicket victory, the Rajasthan Royals climbed to second in the standings and stretched DD’s losing streak to 11 matches. Ajinkya Rahane held his end firm for most part of the innings even as batsmen at the other end walked in, chipped in a few runs and perished. Sanju Samson made 11, captain Steve Smith made 10 and Karun Nair made a breezy 20.

Reduced to 78 for 4 in the 11th over, RR needed 107 from 56 balls, at which point Rahane and Deepak Hooda turned on the heat. Hooda in particular was ruthless; he hit Angelo Mathews for a six and two fours in the 13th over, deposited Unadkat into the stands twice in the 15th over and Imran Tahir into the stands at long on in the 16th over. Rahane and Hooda added 52 runs in 4.3 overs to put their team in the driver’s seat. Rahane creamed three crisp sixes and two boundaries in his 39-ball outing before he perished at the start of the 16th over.

The teenager carried on and brought up his half-century off 22 balls – aided with three boundaries and four hits over the fence. He was dismissed off the first ball of the 19th over when he pulled a long hop but hit it straight down the throat of Mathews at long on. That dismissal triggered a bit of panic in the RR lower order, but Chris Morris struck a four and a six, and Tim Southee drove Angelo Mathews through extra cover for a boundary to take their team past the finish line.

Imran Tahir impressed yet again; he used the leg-breaks and googlies deceptively, presented few scoring opportunities to the RR batsmen and returned with figures of four for 28. Amit Mishra (2-32) and Mathews (1-42) were the other wicket-takers.

Earlier in the evening, put in to bat, the Delhi Daredevils gave their supporters plenty to cheer as their openers Mayank Agarwal and Shreyas Iyer wasted little time in their team off to a brisk start. Agarwal especially was the more aggressive of the two batsmen; the Karnataka lad set the ball rolling with a pull shot off Tim Southee in the first over and then creamed one over the cover boundary in the same bowler’s next over.

Dhawal Kulkarni was welcomed into the attack with three consecutive boundaries by Agarwal and piled on the agony further picking up a boundary off the final delivery of the over. The opening pair was separated in the fifth over – after they had put on 45 runs - when Agarwal danced down the track and attempted to hit over the top but was foxed in length by the experienced Pravin Tambe and hit straight back to the bowler; Agarwal made 37 from 21 balls and hit six boundaries and a six during his vigil at the crease.

JP Duminy promoted himself to number three and batted through to the end of the innings. It was an indifferent innings from the DD captain; up until the final over of the innings – when he struck two sixes – his strike-rate was 88.24. He made 44 from 38 balls and was involved in useful partnerships with Yuvraj Singh (27 batting at number four) and Angelo Mathews (unbeaten 27 batting at number five). This was the first time in DD’s history that they had four partnerships of 40 or more in an IPL innings. As a result, DD finished their 20 overs at a competitive 184 for 3 – their first score of 180 or more batting first since 27 April 2012.

Chris Morris was the most successful of the RR bowlers; the South African returned with figures of 2 for 35. The experienced Tambe, who was surprisingly used only for three overs, had respectable returns of 1 for 18. Deepak Hooda was impressive too; the 19-year old did not concede a single boundary and bowled his four overs for 20 overs. RR’s two experienced bowlers – Tim Southee and James Faulkner – had an off-day at work; while Southee’s four overs cost the team 36 runs, Faulkner – who single-handedly won the team the previous match - registered his most expensive figures in T20 cricket, conceding 55 runs in his four over spell. Only Broad's 0-60 in 4 overs against India in the 2007 ICC T20 World Cup was much worse.

[img]http://pbs.twimg.com/profile_images/585031470437150721/b8-amg2n_normal.jpg[/img\RCB won the toss & chose to field

KKR made a change from the match has thumbed the Mumbai Indians. KC Cariappa was brought in for Umesh Yadav. So they're playing with only 2 seamers. (Morkel & Russell)So the squad looks like
Gambhir(c), Uthappa(wk), Pandey, Suryakumar Yadav, Yusuf Pathan, Shakib, Russell, Chawla, Narine, Morne Morkel, KC Cariappa

Gayle, Mandeep, Kohli(c), Karthik(wk), AB de Villiers, Sammy, Harsha Patel, Chahal, Sean Abbott, Varun Aaron, Nechim

the spoiler below has the match scores
[spoiler]KKR 177-6(20 overs)Gambhir 58, Russell 41*, Chahal 1-28, Nechim 1-21
RCB 179-7(19 overs)Gayle 96, de Villiers 28, Yusuf Pathan 2-40, Shakib 1-17

Chris Gayle announced himself in Pepsi IPL 2015 with a 56-ball 96 that powered the Royal Challengers Bangalore to a 3-wicket win over the defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders. Set to chase 178, Gayle took his time to get going before exploding at the back end of the chase and took his team past the finish line with six balls to spare. RCB’s victory also meant that KKR’s 10-match winning streak was brought to a halt.

KKR must have seen the ominous signs with Gayle applying himself. The Jamaican wasn’t too ruffled despite wickets falling at the other end. Virat Kohli perished for 13, AB de Villiers made 28 from 13 balls, and poor shot selection caused the downfall of the rest of the batsmen.

But Gayle waited for the right moment and for the right bowler to cut loose. On a day when he breached the 7000 runs mark in T20 cricket, the RCB opener picked on the 17th and 18th overs bowled by Shakib-al-Hasan and Sunil Narine respectively to force the pace; he hit Shakib for successive sixes and then picked boundaries off successive Narine deliveries.

One stroke away from what would have been his eighth T20 century and with his team on the brink of a win, Gayle was late in calling for a second run and was beaten by a throw from Manish Pandey. He was dismissed for 96 in an innings studded with seven boundaries and as many sixes – most of which would have cleared the fence of even the biggest grounds in the world.

It was in a way fitting that Abu Nechim, who impressed with the ball earlier in the evening, scored the winning hit; he had the company of Harshal Patel at the other end.

Much like RCB earlier in the evening, KKR too had a rough day on the field. Catches were put down and that had a definite impact on the outcome of the match. Yusuf Pathan surprisingly turned out to be the most successful bowler for the hosts; bowling his off-breaks, he picked up the wickets of Mandeep Singh and Dinesh Karthik. Morne Morkel, debutant KC Cariappa and Shakib-al-Hasan were the other wicket-takers for the hosts.

Earlier in the evening, after being asked to take first strike, the KKR opening pair of Gautam Gambhir and Robin Uthappa wrested the initiative quickly with a 81-run opening stand, with both batsmen contributing almost evenly in the partnership. The partnership was broken when Uthappa’s attempt to hit over long on landed in the laps of Darren Sammy; he made 35 from 28 balls and hit four boundaries during his stay in the middle.

Gambhir carried on to bring up his fifty in the 13th over – his 25th half-century in the IPL – but perished in the following over when he picked out Mandeep Singh at midwicket. Suryakumar Yadav and Manish Pandey contributed cameos before they were dismissed off successive deliveries in the 17th over.

The match hung in the balance at that point, but Andre Russell’s blitz at the end ensured it would be the hosts who would head into the break on a high. Russell, out to bat in the 17th over, struck six boundaries and two fours and raced to 41 from 17 balls as KKR finished their allotted 20 overs at 177 for 6.

RCB’s performance in the field is something they will want to forget in a hurry. From the very first ball, when Abu Nechim Ahmed went down too early and allowed the ball to race past him to the boundary, to AB de Villiers’ dropped catch, there were several instances when RCB’s fielding was not up to the mark.

Abu Nechim and leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal were RCB’s best bowlers finishing with identical figures of 4-0-28-1. Harshal Patel and Varun Aaron were the other wicket-takers, though their eight overs combined cost the team 72 runs. Sean Abbott, playing his first IPL match, finished with figures of 0-36 from three overs.

CSK have won the toss & chose to bat

CSK named an unchanged squad from the team that beat DD by 1 run. SO their squad looks like
Brendom McCullum, Dwayne Smith, Sursh Raina, Faf du Plessis, Ravindra Jadeja, MS Dhoni(c)(wk), Dwayne Bravo, Ravichandran Ashwin, Mohit Sharma, Ishwar Pandey, Ashish Nehra

Shikhar Dhawan, David Warner(c), KL Rahul, Naman Ojha(wk), Kane Williamson, Ravi Bopara, Praveez Rasool, Karn Sharma, Bhuveneshwar Kumar, Ishant Sharma, Trent Boult

CSK 209-4(20 overs)B McCullum 100*, Dhoni 53, Boult 1-34
SRH 164-6(20 overs)Warner 53, Williamson 26*, Mohit 2-36, Bravo 2-25

CSK's innings got off to the best possible start with a 75 run opening partnership. Once Dwayne Smith was dismissed, Raina & MSD contributed with valuable runs. But the biggest contribution was from B McCullum scoring 100* of 56.

SRH's run chase never looked like they were in control. Every time there's a set partnership or a batsman with a start, CSK's bowlers delivered with wickets. In the end, They fell short by a mammoth 45 runs.

KXIP won the toss & chose to field

Virender Sehwag, Murali Vijay, Glenn Maxwell, Glenn Maxwell, David Miller, George Bailey, Wriddiman Saha(wk), Mitchell Johnson, Axar Patel, Anureet Singh, Sandeep SIngh, Karanveer Singh

Ajinkya Rahane, Sanju Samson, Steve Smith(c), Karun Nair, Deepak Hooda, Stuart Binny, James Faulknar, Chris Morris, Tim Southee, Dhawal Kulkarni, Pravin Tambe

RR-162-7(20 overs)Faulknar 46, Smith 33, Anureet 3-23, Johnson 2-34
KXIP-136/8(20 overs)Vijay 37, Bailey, 24, Faulknar 3-26, Southee 2-36

RR started their innings in total disarray when they got 3 early wickets. But Smith and Hoda built a good partnership. Once they were dismissed, it was the finisher, James Faulknar, who came out and smashed 46 of 33 balls. to put RR in a strong position.

In the chase, KXIP lost Sehwag of the very first ball. Apart Vijay(37), Axar(24), Miller(23), Bailey(24), no one got past single figures. They kept losing wickets. In the end, they fell short by 26 runs. Faulknar had a game to remember with both bat & ball. Making 46 with the bat and 3-26 with the ball.

DD won the toss & chose to field

Brendom McCullum, Dwayne Smith, Sursh Raina, Faf du Plessis, Dwayne Bravo, Ravindra Jadeja, MS Dhoni(c)(wk), Ravichandran Ashwin, Mohit Sharma, Ishwar Pandey, Ashish Nehra

Mayank Agarwal, CM Gautam(wk), Shreyas Iyer, JP Duminy(c), Yuvraj Singh, Albie Morkel, Kedar Jadhav, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Amit Mishra, Dominic Joseph, Imran Tahir

KKR won the toss & chose to field

Gambhir(c), Uthappa(wk), Pandey, Suryakumar Yadav, Yusuf Pathan, Shakib, Russell, Chawla, Narine, Umesh Yadav, Morne Morkel

RG Sharma, Finch, Rayudu, Tare(wk), Corey Anderson, Pollard, Harbhajan, Malinga, Vinay Kumar, Bumrah, Pragyan Ojha

MI-168-3(20 overs) RG Sharma 98*, Anderson 55*, Morkel 2-18, Shakib 1-48
KKR-170-3)18.3 overs)Gambhir 57, S Yadav 46*, Anderson 1-21, Harbhajan 1-38

MI started the innings in total disarray losing Finch, Tare and Rayudu in the Powerplay. But Corey Anderson came out to the crease at the score of 37-3, him and RG Sharma put on a 131 run stand, which allowed them to reach 168-3 in 20 overs.

KKR in response suffered a big blow when they lost the orange cap holder Robin Uthappa for just 9 next to his name. But Gautam Gambhir and Manish Pandey stepped up and just a good partnership. Then a quick fire 46 from Suryakumar Yadav sealed the game for KKR.