IPL 2019: Nightmare continues for Royal Challengers Bangalore

Bengaluru: Royal Challengers Bangalore’s nightmarish run continued as they slumped to their sixth consecutive defeat in IPL-12 here at the Chinnaswamy stadium on Sunday. Delhi Capitals, however, had to overcome some anxious moments before posting a four-wicket win. It helped Delhi arrest their two-match losing streak.

Skipper Shreyas Iyer spearheaded Delhi’s chase of 150 with a fine 67 off 50 balls.

Shreyas’ partnerships with Colin Ingram (22) and Rishabh Pant (18) ensured Delhi’s win even though they wobbled a bit towards the end.

Shreyas showed intent to wrap up the match early as he deposited Yuzvendra Chahal’s delivery into the second tier. But Navdeep Saini trapped him with a short ball. Saini followed it up with another scalp, dismissing Chris Morris.

The young Indian pacer was one of the few RCB players who held their head up high.

Earlier, after being asked to bat, Virat Kohli’s men failed to put up a competitive total. As they lost Parthiv Patel to a Chris Morris short ball just two overs into the match, RCB had to be cautious. The onus of building a strong foundation fell on skipper Kohli and AB de Villiers, but South African’s lean patch continued.
 
Kagiso Rabada who was brought into the attack in the last over of the powerplay dismissed his compatriot de Villiers with an excellent slower delivery.

As RCB kept losing wickets at regular intervals from then on, Kohli had to change his plans and dig deep. Moeen Ali’s late blitz (32 off 18 balls) brightened up the mood a bit. But he was smartly stumped by Pant off Sandeep Lamicchane.

Kohli had just one boundary to his name when the powerplay came to an end. He launched himself on leggie Lamicchane by slamming two sixes before Rabada removed Kohli. Rabada finished with impressive figure of 4-0-21-4.