IPL-2010 Cricket: Chennai Super Kings rides over Bengaluru Roayal Challengers

In Chepauk Stadium here, The Chennai Super Kings (CSK), riding on a sparkling knock of 78 from opener M Vijay and an equally scintillating unbeaten 44 off 35 balls with four fours and a six trounced Royal Challengers Bangalore(RCB) by five wickets off 19 overs and broke their four consecutive defeats, on Wednesday evening.

CSK scored 166 in just 19 overs against the target of 161 set by the RCB.
Earlier, batting first on winning the toss, the Royal Challengers made 161 for 4 in 20 overs but failed to defend the score.

The Super Kings have now three wins in eight matches to take their points tally to six. The Challengers, who suffered their third loss in seven matches, have four wins. Their point tally is eight.

The adrenalin started flowing again for the Super Kings, as it appeared, the opener, local lad M Vijay with his senior partner Mathew Hayden watching with admiration, took the Royal Challengers pacemen Praveen Kumar and Dale Stein head on.

The Super Kings coasted to 38 in the first three overs, Vijay taking 24 runs off Praveen in the third over unleashing some fine strokes as the home fans cheered wildly for him.
The first two overs yielded 14 runs.

That prompted the Challengers captain Anil Kumble to bring himself on in the fourth over to cut the pace off the Super Kings hitting and perhaps gain a breakthrough. But he had to wait for the break through till the Super Kings added 23 runs more. Off the fifth ball of the seventh over, Kumble, changing end, baffled Hayden with a googly. He had the left-hander stumped drawn yards down the crease.

Hayden fell for 12 off 14 balls without a boundary. At 61 for one, the Super Kings, needing a win to break their jinx of no win in the last four matches, were 100 runs away from the target the Challengers had set them.

As the 13th over ended, the Super Kings were 50 runs away from the Challengers score with eight wickets in hand and none other than captain M S Dhoni batting with Raina. The Challengers were under pressure as Raina hit a six off the first ball of the 14th over by Vinay Kumar.

As Suresh Raina, the left joined him, Vijay continued his scoring spree. He posted his first IPL 50 off 29 balls with three fours and an equal number of sixes. His fourth six came off Kevin Pietersen whom Kumble brought in his place. But it was Pietersen who had the last laugh, as it were. For in the 11th over Vijay lifted him for three sixes. But attempting a fourth, the young Tamil Nadu batsman was 'gobbled up' by Manish Pandey at long on boundary. Raina and Vijay put on 45 runs for the third wicket off 42 overs.

-Asian Tribune-