Mumbai Indians have some thinking to do after RCB loss, says Ricky Ponting

The second game of Indian Premier League (IPL) took the excitement to the next level on Thursday, when Chris Gayle showed his magic with the ball, and smashed a blistering knock of 92 to guide Royal Challengers Bangalore to a tight win over Mumbai Indians.

Both teams were determined to kick off their campaign on a winning note, but Lady Luck eventually smiled on the Royal Challengers. It was interesting that both sides entered the league with new captains.

While Ricky Ponting took over the charge from Harbhajan Singh, Virat Kohli replaced Daniel Vettori as RCB’s full-time captain. The encounter started with great thrill. Batting first, the Bangalore side lost opener Tillakaratne Dilshan very early.

After the loss of the islander, it was entirely Gayle’s game. With the help of five mighty sixes and 11 boundaries, he scored an unbeaten knock of 92. His innings was so dominating that besides Extras only two other Bangalore batsmen could touch the double
figures.

Thanks to the Caribbean star, the home side put up a decent total of 156. It did not look like a tough target, when two legends Sachin Tendulkar and Ponting started off the innings nicely.

Both right-handers laid a solid foundation by putting a 52-run-partnership. Dinesh Karthik continued the drama, and scored an aggressive innings of 60 runs after the loss of the opening batsmen.

But there was no one to help him. After a nail-biting contest, the Royal Challengers managed to hold off the opposition, and won the game only by a couple of runs.

Ponting was disappointed over his bowlers’ show, and said his side now has plenty of areas to address. He stated after the match: “I may have lost most of my finger nails. It’s disappointing not to have won the game. We have to analyse the way we played.
I think we were a bit behind with our bowing.”

Bangalore skipper, on the other hand, was delighted and shared: "Chris batted beautifully. We knew 157 was good enough. Despite the dew, our fielding was good. The way Unadkat bowled towards the end was good."

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Posted by Rana Nasir Ghafoor on Apr 5 2013. Filed under Sports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry