Bengaluru: It was all in vain for Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper Virat Kohli as Sunrisers Hyderabad ultimately had the 'Cutting Edge' on the final night.
Sunrisers Hyderabad rode on an all-round performance by Ben Cutting and a sterling innings by skipper David Warner to beat Royal&nbsp;Challengers Bangalore by eight runs to clinch their maiden IPL&nbsp;title here on Sunday night.
Hyderabad had set a huge total of 208/7 for Bangalore to chase -- the highest ever score by a team batting first in&nbsp;an IPL final. And the hosts, despite a brilliant start by Virat Kohli and Chris Gayle, fell short.&nbsp;
<img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/images/2016/may/kohli-iplfinal.jpg" alt="Royal Challengers Bangalore captain and batsman Virat Kohli bends down with disappointment in the players dug out after being bowled out during the final Twenty20 cricket match of the 2016 Indian Premier League (IPL) between Royal Challengers Bangalore and Sunrisers Hyderabad at The M. Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore on Sunday night" /> Royal Challengers Bangalore captain and batsman Virat Kohli bends down with disappointment in the players dug out after being bowled out during the IPL 9 final vs Sunrisers Hyderabad at The M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore on Sunday night. Pic/AFP
In a battle between IPL's best batting and bowling&nbsp;line-ups, the Orange Army came up trumps despite initial&nbsp;blitzkrieg from Chris Gayle and Kohli, defending their total&nbsp;of 208 for seven by restricting the home team to 200 for&nbsp;seven.
It was David Warner's batting and astute captaincy&nbsp;complemented by some inspirational death overs bowling by&nbsp;Mustafizur Rahaman (1/37 in 4 overs) and Bhuvneshwar Kumar&nbsp;(0/25 in 4 overs) that clinched the issue.
Warner, who hit 68, finished second in run-getters' list&nbsp;with 848 runs.
The turning point certainly would be the 24 runs that Ben&nbsp;Cutting (39 no and 2/35) got in the final over off Shane&nbsp;Watson's bowling during Sunrisers innings and then came back&nbsp;to dismiss a rampaging Gayle.
With 18 needed off last over, Bhuvneshwar, who bowled 13&nbsp;dot balls gave only 9 runs. As the last ball was delivered,&nbsp;skipper Warner's joy knew no bounds with the entire team and&nbsp;dug-out joining him in wild celebrations.
Gayle (76 off 38 balls) and skipper Kohli (54 off 35&nbsp;balls) had a scintillating opening stand of 114 in 10.3 overs as it looked like a cakewalk for the home team.&nbsp;
But in the end, Kohli was the tragic hero once again&nbsp;after the WorldT20 in a tournament that will be remembered for&nbsp;his exploits.&nbsp;
He finished the tournament with an astounding 973 runs at&nbsp;an average of 81.08 and and equally impressive strike-rate of&nbsp;152.03. He hit an unbelievable four hundreds and seven&nbsp;half-centuries, not to forget 83 boundaries and a staggering&nbsp;38 sixes.
Once the duo were back in quick succession, it depended&nbsp;AB de Villiers (5), who had one of his rare failures as&nbsp;Sunrisers came back into the match.
KL Rahul was done in by a slow off-cutter from Cutting&nbsp;and Shane Watson found it hard to get the big shots going as&nbsp;Mustafizur accounted for him.
Stuart Binny hit Mustafizur down the ground for a six as&nbsp;the equation came down to 37 from 3 overs.&nbsp;But Bhuvneshwar bowled a brilliant 18th over keeping&nbsp;everything in the blockhole as only 7 came off the over.&nbsp;
RCB 30 were needed off last two overs as Binny (9) was&nbsp;run-out off the first delivery of the 19th over bowled by&nbsp;Mustafizur. Sachin Baby hit six off the last ball as RCB's&nbsp;requirement of final over was 18 runs but Bhuvneshwar kept his&nbsp;cool to win the match for Sunrisers.&nbsp;
Earlier, Warner blasted his&nbsp;way to a 38-ball-69 as unheralded Cutting's incredible&nbsp;hitting enabled Sunrisers Hyderabad get to an imposing 208&nbsp;for seven against Bangalore.&nbsp;
It was little-known Cutting who smashed 39 off 15 balls with three boundaries and four sixes to take the Sunrisers past 200-run mark. The last three overs produced 52 runs while Shane Watson (0/61 in 4 overs) went for 24 in his final over out of which Cutting scored 23.
Warner once again led from the front with another&nbsp;sizzling knock but the likes of Yuvraj Singh (38, 23 balls),&nbsp;Shikhar Dhawan (28, 25 balls) frittered away promising starts&nbsp;before Ben provided the 'Cutting Edge' with some lusty late&nbsp;hitting&nbsp;For RCB, Sreenath Aravind (2/30 in 4 overs), Chris Jordan&nbsp;(3/45 in 4 overs) were the main wicket-takers.
Sunrisers started the attack in the penultimate over of&nbsp;the Powerplay where skipper Virat Kohli introduced Shane&nbsp;Watson into the attack. As many as 19 runs came off that over.&nbsp;
Both Watson and Dhawan helped themselves to a six each --&nbsp;the skipper hitting it over cover and the India international&nbsp;over long-on.&nbsp;
Chris Gayle, who shared the new ball with Sreenath&nbsp;Aravind had given 11 in his first two overs but went for 13 in&nbsp;the 6th over of the innings as the Powerplay yielded 59 runs.&nbsp;
It was the introduction of Yuzvendra Chahal that saw the&nbsp;home team drawing the first blood when Dhawan mistimed a slog&nbsp;sweep to be caught at square leg boundary by Jordan. The&nbsp;opening stand produced 63 runs.&nbsp;
Dhawan hit three fours and a six in his innings.&nbsp;
But there was no stopping Warner as he blazed his way to&nbsp;a 24-ball half centiry with two punish cut shots off Chahal,&nbsp;who lost the length of his leg breaks.&nbsp;
In the next over from Jordan, he first flicked and then&nbsp;cut the bowler for two boundaries.&nbsp;
Moises Henriques (4) may have shared a 34-run stand but&nbsp;it was all due to his skipper's pyrotechnics as Jordan had&nbsp;something to cheer with the batsman giving skier to Chahal at&nbsp;mid-wicket.
Yuvraj got into the groove with a couple of well-times&nbsp;boundaries -- a sweetly timed cover drive off Watson and then&nbsp;a whip off Jordan behind square. And he was not complete as&nbsp;the next was a six in the same region.
(With Agency Inputs)

Virat Kohli's fairytale IPL 9 journey ended in disappointment as Sunrisers Hyderabad rode on a team performance to beat Royal Challengers Bangalore by 8 runs and clinch their maiden IPL title

Sunrisers Hyderabad lift IPL 9 trophy as Virat Kohli's fairytale is cut short

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Home / Sports / Cricket / Article / Sunrisers Hyderabad lift IPL 9 trophy as Virat Kohli's fairytale is cut short

Sunrisers Hyderabad lift IPL 9 trophy as Virat Kohli's fairytale is cut short

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