Adam Gilchrist
It was a fantastic treat for the home fans as Dharamshala saw their team stroll to a 111 run victory over table toppers RCB thanks to a magnificent century from their captain Adam Gilchrist and a fine bowling performance by Piyush Chawla who notched up figures of 4 for 17 and seems back to his best after a confidence-shaking world cup.
The Kings XI recovered from a slow start which saw them make just 30 off the first 6 overs to post a mammoth 232-2 off their twenty overs. It was Gilchrist at his glorious best, supported by Shaun Marsh at the other end, who set off the blistering fireworks as he smashed six after six to complete his second IPL century in style. Shaun Marsh soon came to the party, smashing 30 runs off a Johan van der Wath over and he ended up with 79 off 49 deliveries. Gilchrist even smashed the biggest six of the tournament as he hit a monstrous shot 122 metres and out of the ground. There were a few records broken while he was at the crease as they smashed the highest number of sixes in an innings of this edition of the IPL while also mounting the highest partnership for any wicket in all of the IPL. It was a tame end to the innings however as Gilchrist tried to guide the ball out to third man off a wide full toss, only to see the huge frame of Gayle in the way. But the damage had been done and RCB knew that in order to win, they had to chase down the biggest total of the fourth edition of the IPL.
Chris Gayle, who had been smacking his lips at the prospect of playing on this high altitude ground, was welcomed to the crease by swingers from Praveen Kumar who got his 5th maiden over of the tournament. Chris Gayle is not a man to be kept quiet and the next time he was on strike, he tried to heave it over the offside but only managed to knick the ball to Gilly and Ryan Harris celebrated with the rest of the team and in fact, the whole stadium as they knew the destructive form that this man had been in. RCB, who have grown to depend on Gayle for all their batting solutions, never recovered from that blow. As the scoreboard pressure mounted, even the mature Virat Kohli fell as he tried to accelerate. There was no saving grace for the RCB as they all collapsed in a heap and ended up losing all their wickets with only 121 on the board. The Kings XI notching up a huge win which keeps them in contention for the play offs.
It was a result which got Adam Gilchrist a huge hug from Preity Zinta and put Kings XI Punjab’s net run rate back in the positive and that might very well be a factor in the qualification race. This puts pressure on the KKR when they take on Dada and the Pune Warriors India on Friday as a loss might very well take them below the Kings XI Punjab in the table. And the plot thickens.
Tags: Adam Gilchrist, Dharamshala, Kings XI Punjab, KXIP, Preity Zinta, RCB, Royal Challengers Bangalore
