Veterans Adam Gilchrist (85 not out, 54b, 10x4, 3x6) and Azhar Mahmood (61, 41b, 8x4, 1x6) rolled back the years as the duo spearheaded a resurgent Kings XI Punjab to a seven-wicket win over Royal Challengers Bangalore in a crucial Pepsi Indian Premier League (IPL) game here Tuesday.
Skipper Adam Gilchrist finally led from the front with a dazzling unbeaten 85 to guide Kings XI Punjab to a comfortable seven-wicket victory over Royal Challengers in a Pepsi Indian Premier League match at u00a0M Chinnaswamy Stadium on Tuesday.
Chasing a stiff target of 175, Gilchrist blazed his way to a 54-ball 85, which had 10 fours and three huge sixes as his team romped home with 11 balls to spare, thereby keeping doors of the play-offs open.
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Kings XI with 12 points from 14 matches are now in sixth position -- courtesy a better net run-rate than defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders who are also on 12 points.
Adam Gilchrist led from the front with a dazzling unbeaten 85 to guide Kings XI Punjab to a comfortable seven-wicket victory over Royal Challengers.
The win also helped Gautam Gambhir's men stay in contention as an RCB victory would have decisively shut the doors on their play-off chances.
The defeat for RCB also made the sitiation tricky for Virat Kohli and co, who now have 16 points from 15 games and will need to win their final game at any cost.
The foundation of this win was laid by two veterans Gilchrist and Azhar Mahmood, who added 118 runs for the second wicket.
Mahmood scored 61 off 41 balls with eight fours and a six.
The duo, whose cumulative age is 79 years, proved that there is no substitute of experience as they both brought in their oodles of experience in international cricket to pave the way for an easy win.
This was after Zaheer Khan, who made a comeback in competitive cricket after nearly five months cleaned up Shaun Marsh in his very second over.
It was Mahmood, who first gave the charge hitting Moises Henriques for three successive boundaries in the last over of the Powerplay (6th).
Taking a cue from Mahmood's posituve approach, Gilchrist, who had only one score of 40 plus in the tournament also got into the groove as he hit some cracking strokes.
The Aussie dasher brought up his half century with a straight six off Zaheer. The stand-out hit will, however, be the the inside out six over extra cover off Muttiah Muralitharan. He followed it up with another six -- a slog sweep over deep square leg.u00a0
Earlier, Chris Gayle's power-hitting in the back 10 and skipper Virat Kohli's half-century enabled Royal Challengers Bangalore to reach a challenging 174 for five after being put into bat.
While Gayle helped himself to a 53-ball-77 with the help of four boundaries and six huge sixes, Kohli's contribution of 57 off 43 balls (6x4, 2x6) was equally significant in their 137-run second wicket stand.
Chris Gayle began sedately, but ended withu00a053-ball-77 with the help of four boundaries and six huge sixes.
In fact, the final six overs of the innings produced a whopping 86 runs with Gayle hitting Manpreet Gony for three successive sixes with 22 runs coming off the 15th over of the innings.
With Kohli hitting Parvinder Awana for a six and a four, 15 runs came off the very next over. RCB got the required momentum which seemed missing during the first 10 overs when Gayle was more intent on pushing for singles and twos as he couldn't consistently get the big hits going in his favour.
RCB completed 50 runs only in the 10th over and with Gayle still at the crease, it was something that even the die-hard home team fans couldn't believe.
For the Kings XI, Awana had the best figures of three for 39 while Mahmood was certainly the most effective bowler with clever variation and mix that he used to finish with two for 24 in 4 overs.u00a0
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