This was the opening match for the Royal Challengers Bangalore and playing in front of their home crowd is always an advantage. After losing the toss the RCB openers put on a solid stand for 37 in just 4 overs, Pujara was the first batsmen to get out gifting his wicket to the Delhi speed star Morne Morkel, It was once again in the hands of No.3 specialist Virat Kohli the Indian vice captain, The Renegades batsman Andrew McDonald played well for his quick fire 30 of just 19 balls, it was again Morkel who struck for his second wicket took the wicket of McDonald who was looking really dangerous Rcb were 46/2 in 6 overs, the South African captain/wicket keeper Ab De villers and Virat was expected to play a long innings, but Virat's stay did not last long, and soon there was a pressure building on the batting side losing some quick wickets and It was in the hands of Ab who played so well till the end, with some contributions from Mayank Agarwal and Vinay down the order RCB reached a modest total of 157/8 and it was none other than Ab De Villers who did all the hard work and made sure he stayed till the end with 64 not out.
We had Murali this time. The spin king from the Sri Lanka and with Vettori the bowling combination needs to be awesome and the bowling unit looked pretty confident as well, defending a total of 157 is quite hard these days int-20 with Sehwag the most dangerous batsmen in the world, opening for delhi,but Zak removed Sehwag in no time and Sehwag was out for a duck as he did no damage to the score card, the opening combo Vinay/Zak kept bowling well and did not leave much runs as well. Time for some spin action, Vettori is always a pretty cool customer when it comes to pressure situations and he did rotate his bowlers really well and he brought Murali just at the right time and he picked three crucial wickets that turned the match for the home side. It was advantage RCB every time when the pressure kept building among the Delhi batsmen who found really hard to get runs. Andrew Mcdonald proved his worth with his bowling skills as well, he bowled a couple of overs including a wicket with the economy just under 6. Every bowler who came into bowl made sure they did not give away much runs and also made sure Delhi batsmen did not build any partnerships and they kept taking wickets at regular intervals. In the end Delhi managed to score 137 for the loss of 7 wickets and RCB won their opening match of this 5th IPL edition, as expected AB was adjudged MOM for his match saving/winning knock
of 64 and it was Murali, with his three wickets remained the main architect along with Ab. Keep Cheering! And we Keep winning! We are the Royal Challengers Bangalore! Game for More!!
