Chennai Super Kings v Kings XI Punjab, IPL 2012, Chennai,cricinfo,watch highlights

Punjab win to join mid-table scrum 

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Twenty-year-old opener Mandeep Singh made his second Twenty20 half-century to help Kings XI Punjab reach 156, but it was less than what they looked set to achieve after a bright start. R Ashwin dried up the runs early, before Chennai Super Kings' trio of overseas medium-pacers made sure there was no late flourish from Punjab.

Mandeep wilted under the punishing heat and humidity of a Chennai afternoon and was struggling for the most part in the latter half of the innings. Midway through his knock, after about 45 minutes of batting, a stream of sweat poured out as he tipped his helmet to the side. He was dismissed in the 17th over, but had hit only one boundary since the Powerplay.

He had begun well, though, with the promoted Shaun Marsh. Avoiding the slogs and heaves that are integral to Twenty20, and favouring inside-out drives, Mandeep provided the initial acceleration for Punjab. Marsh is rarely out of form in the IPL, and today was no different. His onslaught against Shadab Jakati took Punjab to 68 for 0 after eight overs before the stand was snapped. Marsh was caught out of his crease by a straight hit from Mandeep that ricocheted off the bowler Ashwin's boot onto the stumps.

Azhar Mahmood was sent up the order, and though he slammed a couple of nonchalant sixes off Ravindra Jadeja he exited early, trapped lbw by Dwayne Bravo. Punjab then decided to push David Miller ahead of their best Twenty20 player and captain, David Hussey, a move they could come to regret as Miller flailed around for 19 before guiding a slower bouncer to the keeper.

Hussey had only four overs to bat, which meant he had to swing from ball one. He failed, soon after Mandeep's tired heave to long-off, and Punjab went on to lose 6 for 27 towards the end of the innings.

Chennai's biggest moment of concern in the second half of Punjab's batting was when Faf du Plessis and Bravo collided when going for a catch on the straight boundary, and were left floored. Neither was seriously hurt, though, and after a minute or so lying prone, both were able to resume fielding. Bravo even pulled off an athletic overhead catch running in from long-off, and bowled at the death to finish with 3 for 29, making Chennai the favourites to take the game.

Chennai Super Kings v Royal Challengers Bangalore, IPL 2012,Cricinfo

Chennai Super Kings 208 for 5 (Du Plessis 71, Dhoni 41, Murali 3-21) beat Royal Challengers Bangalore205 for 8 (Gayle 68, Kohli 57, Bollinger 3-24) by five wickets

Albie Morkel ransacked 28 runs off the first six balls he faced - the 19th over - to pull off an incredible heist for Chennai Super Kings, the second highest successful chase in the IPL. Chasing 206, Super Kings needed 43 off 12 balls, and Royal Challengers Bangalore would have thought the match safe, only for Morkel to shatter the notion by savaging Virat Kohli's over. He launched three sixes, two fours and ran a two, to leave Super Kings with 15 to get in the last over. Although Morkel was caught on the boundary, leaving Super Kings needing 14 off four balls, Dwayne Bravo was on hand to finish it off, helped by a no-ball and a full toss from Vinay Kumar.

Royal Challengers score of 205, powered by Chris Gayle and Virat Kohli, was the first total in excess of 200 in this IPL. They were set for a larger score but lost five wickets in six deliveries at the end of their innings, a collapse they were left to rue.

More to follow ...

20 overs Royal Challengers Bangalore 205 for 8 (Gayle 68, Kohli 57, Bollinger 3-24) v Chennai Super Kings

Royal Challengers Bangalore, powered by Chris Gayle and Virat Kohli, became the first team to breach the 200-run mark in IPL 2012. On a batting friendly pitch, Royal Challengers faced little threat from the conditions and the attack as Chennai Super Kings' bowlers kept their answers to the persistent onslaught for the end, when they took five wickets in six deliveries.

Mayank Agarwal opened the innings instead of Cheteshwar Pujara, and did so in blistering fashion, laying the platform for Gayle and Kohli to construct a skyscraper on. Contrasting half-centuries from both batsmen, who scored at a sustained rate throughout their time at the crease, put Royal Challengers in a commanding position despite the flurry of wickets at the end.

Agarwal initially eclipsed Gayle, peppering the off side with powerful shots as he lofted the ball over mid-off and timed it sweetly through covers. He did not always get it right, though, and mistimed a sweep to Doug Bollinger at fine leg, a simple chance that should have been gobbled up. Bollinger let the ball slip through his fingers and gave Agarwal a lifeline on 16, which he made fairly good use of as he continued to hog the strike.

After five overs, Gayle had faced only five balls and had not scored a boundary. He was content to wait while Agarwal ushered Royal Challengers to the first half-century score inside five overs this season. When he had enough of the off-side, Agarwal shifted his focus and smacked R Ashwin for two sixes on the leg side. The fun eventually ended when Albie Morkel was introduced and Agarwal top-edged a slower ball bouncer to mid-on.

Three overs of sobriety followed as the change bowlers sent down a slew of slower balls to control the run-rate. The quiet was short lived. Gayle woke from his slumber when Suresh Raina came on to bowl. After scoring without boundaries, Gayle unleashed three sixes in the ninth over, which cost Super Kings 21, the most expensive of the innings. Two were sent sailing over long-on and the third was smoked off the back foot when Raina dropped short.

While Gayle gathered runs with power, Kohli did it with placement and timing. Their partnership grew to the highest in this edition of the IPL. MS Dhoni tried to stop the bleeding through Dwayne Bravo and Morkel, the only bowlers to have some measure of control by using changes of pace. Even Bravo's resistance crumbled, though, when Gayle sent a slower ball on to the stadium's roof.

It was up to Ravindra Jadeja, who was held back until the 17th over, to remove Gayle. His departure made little difference as Kohli damaged Morkel's figures, before becoming the first of Bollinger's three wickets in the final over. Bollinger had Kohli caught at long-on, Pujara bowled next ball and Raju Bhatkal caught at mid-off, as well as the run-out of Daniel Vettori to ensure Royal Challengers only inched over the 200 mark.

Nokia T20 Champions League T&T vs CSK

T&T bowlers torment Super Kings

  

 

Chennai Super Kings got a taste of its own medicine as Trinidad & Tobago's assortment of slow and medium bowlers consigned the local side to a 12-run defeat, its second in three matches, and pushed it to the brink of elimination in the Champions League T20 at the M.A. Chidambaram Stadium on Sunday.

Sunil Narine (three for eight off four overs), in the company of Kevin Cooper (one for 15 off four) and Samuel Badree (none for 15 off four), strangled Chennai's chase of T&T's 123, reducing the late show of Dwayne Bravo (32 not out, 22b, 5x4) and Albie Morkel (18 not out, 12b, 2x6) to an exercise in shoring up the side's net run rate.

The scenarios

If T&T loses its remaining fixture against Cape Cobras, the defending champion will find itself out of the tournament, while a loss for the South African side will still need Super Kings to beat New South Wales Blues convincingly to qualify.

Super Kings' batting, which has looked a little suspect all tournament, crumbled on a wicket that was slow, but not impossible to bat on.

Barring Bravo, nobody looked comfortable. M.S. Dhoni scratched around for seven off 22 balls; S. Badrinath did only a little better, taking 26 balls to get to 14, as the chase never took off against some sustained and accurate slow bowling.

Added significance

Narine's figures assume added significance as he bowled half his overs during the Power Play. The wickets he picked up were that of Murali Vijay (out bowled) playing across, Suresh Raina and Dhoni (both out caught and bowled) — any one of whom could have taken the match away.

The home team retained its line-up, passing up on the opportunity to add an extra spinner (or a pure batsman) to its ranks in the place of Wriddhiman Saha, a change that would have been understandable looking at how the low-scoring Mumbai Indians-New South Wales Blues match that was played on the same sluggish wicket panned out earlier.

Perhaps, how MI and NSW Blues set out in the early start (eight wickets went down across the two Power Plays) had some lessons for T&T. The West Indian side elected to keep its line intact against Doug Bollinger (three for 30) and Albie Morkel, inching to 28 at the end of the Power Play and 34 after eight overs.

The flip side of such a strategy, especially in the 20-over format, is that the side that is off to a circumspect start finds itself in a hole when wickets go down in a hurry, as the visitors were to discover.

Perking it up

William Perkins (34, 28b, 2x4, 2x6) was the first to break out, smacking the Super Kings spinners for two sixes before cutting Shadab Jakati (two for 18) straight to Badrinath in the 10th over. Lendl Simmons (20, 33b, 1x4) was run out in the next over and when Darren Bravo chipped Jakati straight back, T&T had lost three wickets for five runs in 14 balls.

The Caribbean side went boundary-less for a stretch of almost six overs when the home team's spinners were in operation, and wickets continued to tumble too.

On the balance of things, however, the discreet start did prove a success as it left T&T with enough hitters at the deep end.

Adrian Barath (23, 22b, 2x4) and Kevin Cooper (28, 10b, 1x4, 3x6) slogged to good effect, taking T&T to 123, a total that proved too much for Super Kings.

The scores:

Trinidad & Tobago: L. Simmons (run out) 20 (33b, 1x4), W. Perkins c Badrinath b Jakati 34 (28b, 2x4, 2x6), Darren Bravo c & b Jakati 1 (6b), A. Barath b Bollinger 23 (22b, 2x4), D. Ganga c Raina b Ashwin 8 (10b), D. Ramdin lbw b Dwayne Bravo 3 (4b), K. Cooper c Dwayne Bravo b Bollinger 28 (10b, 1x4, 3x6), S. Ganga b Bollinger 3 (6b), R. Rampaul (not out) 1 (1b); Extras (lb-1, w-1): 2; Total (for eight wkts. in 20 overs): 123.

Fall of wickets: 1-52, 2-55, 3-57, 4-72, 5-90, 6-92, 7-110, 8-123.

Chennai Super Kings bowling: Morkel 4-0-24-0, Bollinger 4-0-30-3, Dwayne Bravo 4-0-25-1, Jakati 4-0-18-2, Ashwin 4-0-25-1.

Chennai Super Kings: M. Hussey c Ramdin b Rampaul 13 (12b, 2x4), M. Vijay b Narine 6 (8b, 1x4), S. Raina c & b Narine 2 (8b), S. Badrinath (run out) 14 (26b, 1x4), W. Saha lbw b Cooper 8 (11b), M.S. Dhoni c & b Narine 7 (22b), Dwayne Bravo (not out) 32 (22b, 5x4), A. Morkel (not out) 18 (12b, 2x6); Extras (lb-6, w-4, nb-1): 11; Total (for six wkts. in 20 overs): 111.

Fall of wickets: 1-21, 2-25, 3-27, 4-48, 5-52, 6-75.

Trinidad & Tobago bowling: Badree 4-0-14-0, Rampaul 4-0-35-1, Narine 4-0-8-3, S. Ganga 4-0-33-0, Cooper 4-0-15-1.

Chennai Super Kings keen to register first points

 

NSW Blues takes on Trinidad and Tobago in day game

Champions League T20 action shifts to the M.A. Chidambaram Stadium here with a doubleheader scheduled for Wednesday. Teams coming off defeats — New South Wales Blues and Trinidad and Tobago — collide in the day game, followed by the showcase evening face-off between Chennai Super Kings and Cape Cobras.

Having surrendered its prolonged winning streak on home turf to a loss against Mumbai Indians this past week, Super Kings will be keen to register its first points in the tournament. The pattern of batting first and letting spin and a vociferous crowd support overwhelm the opposition looked good to go against Mumbai, before Malinga's freakish cameo knocked the host out.

Temporary setback

Coach Stephen Fleming said on Tuesday that the derailment of proven tactics was but a temporary setback.

“After we dominated 95 per cent of the game against Mumbai, one player took it away from us. We're not going to go back to the drawing board just because we lost a match. But I wasn't particularly happy with how we bowled in the first six overs, especially the length,” said Fleming.

The New Zealander felt there were not going to be any easy games for any team.

“There have been some close games in the past few days and we have no idea how many wins it will take to qualify (for the semifinals) or what a good run-rate will be. The tournament has come alive,” he said

For Cape Cobras, it will be a chance to rack up its second win on the trot after defeating NSW Blues in the first game. Although the margin of victory on that occasion – seven wickets – was comfortable,

Cobras dropped a few catches and missed a run-out in the Power Play overs.

All-rounder Vernon Philander took two wickets for 21 in four overs, but dropped Shane Watson.

He attributed the rustiness in the field to lack of outdoor training back home in South Africa. “We haven't practiced outdoors too much in Cape Town because it's been raining.

It's not the same if you've been working indoors and haven't had enough outdoor sessions. We will try to be on the money in the next game,” Philander said.

The 26-year-old acquitted himself with a tidy performance with the ball – the result of sticking to the basics. “I thought the wicket was pretty slow and I tried to mix up my pace and keep it pretty simple,” he said.

Meanwhile, NSW Blues and Trinidad and Tobago search for their first wins when they take on each other. NSW made a hash of a great start against Cobras as none of the batsmen hung around long enough to build on the initial thrust.

One positive for NSW was the pace and carry generated by its young quick Pat Cummins. However, the logic of playing two green pace bowlers – Cummins and Mitchell Starc – and keeping the experienced Stuart Clark out came under scrutiny on Tuesday.

Clark may play

Clark had starred for NSW in its victorious 2009 CLT20 campaign with nine wickets in six games at an economy rate of 4.90.

“He's obviously a very experienced bowler and he was a good part of our campaign here in 2009 when he played a pretty key role. I'm sure if the selectors see it fit to bring him back in for this next game tomorrow, they will do so,” said all-rounder Steve Smith.

Trinidad and Tobago, apparently, was still reeling under the after-effects of its last-ball loss to Mumbai in Bangalore.

“It's very disappointing to have lost that game, but the boys are still pumped. Since the wicket at Chepauk is a bit slow, it should favour us.

“Hopefully we can restrict NSW to 120-140 and chase it down,” said wicket-keeper Denesh Ramdin, who contributed to the loss to Mumbai with a golden duck and a botched relay-throw to the stumps on the last ball of the match.