A thrilling fourth-wicket partnership of 144 between Shimron Hetmyer and Gurkeerat Singh enabled the Royal Challengers Bangalore to end their otherwise disappointing IPL with a four-wicket win over the Sunrisers Hyderabad at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru on Saturday night.
Full ScorecardIt was only RCB's fifth win of the competition and it came without major contributions from their big guns, Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers.
For Hetmyer, a 22-year-old Guyanan, his 75 in 47 balls was his maiden IPL half-century while the cool, calculating Singh was at least as impressive with his second IPL fifty.
.@RCBTweets win by 4 wickets and sign off their #VIVOIPL campaign on a high ??#RCBvSRH pic.twitter.com/uD0rmxiL1C
— IndianPremierLeague (@IPL) May 4, 2019
Nevertheless, RCB kept their fans on tender hooks after the quick dismissals of Hetmyer and Singh and the first-ball exit of Washington Sundar.
But Umesh Yadav ignited the crowd's joy when he slammed the first two balls of the final over from Mohammad Nabi for four to clinch victory.
For Sunrisers, their playoff fate is now no longer in their own hands and the Kolkota Knight Riders will move past them if they beat the Mumbai Indians on Sunday.
Chasing 176 for victory, RCB suffered a disastrous start when Parthiv Patel was out in Bhuvneshwar Kumar’s opening over, before Khaleel Ahmed claimed the key wicket of Kohli, caught behind as he flicked at a ball that went across him.
Kumar then returned to find the edge of De Villiers's bat who offered a sharp catch to Martin Guptill at slip.
That made it 20 for three in the third over, but the home team fought their way back into the match through Hetmeyer and Singh.
The aggressive Guyanan was particularly severe on legspinner Rashid Khan, striking four fours and six sixes in his 47-ball innings, while Singh was clinical.
LIGHTNING STARTEarlier, a disastrous final over from Yadav and a superb unbeaten 70 in 43 balls from Kane Williamson enabled the Sunrisers to compile 175 for seven in their innings after Kohli won the toss and inserted the visitors.
Yadav, who has struggled in the "death" overs in this IPL, went for 28 runs in the final over as Williamson hit his first four balls for 6464, going to his first fifty in this year’s IPL in the process.
Williamson came to the wicket after his team had begun to falter following a lightning start to the innings (46 in 4.3 overs) from Guptill and Wriddhiman Saha.
But after the dismissal of Saha, who was the first of Navdeep Saini's two victims, the innings went into reverse as tall offspinner Washington Sundar grabbed the key wickets of Guptill and the prolific Manish Pandey in his first over while conceding only two runs.
Williamson, who has struggled with injury and a lack of runs in this year's competition, began carefully, knowing he needed to bat through the innings.
He added 45 with Vijay Shankar (27 off 19 balls), but wickets fell regularly at the other end, including that of veteran Yusuf Pathan who became the 100th wicket in IPL for RCB's excellent legspinner Yuzvendra Chahal, who finished with 1-24 in his four overs.
The most successful bowler for the hosts was Sundar who finished with 3-24 in three overs.
ROYAL CHALLENGERS BANGALORE: Parthiv Patel (wk), Virat Kohli (capt), AB de Villiers, Shimron Hetmyer, Gurkeerat Singh, Shivam Dube, Colin de Grandhomme, Washington Sundar, Umesh Yadav, Navdeep Saini, Yuzvendra Chahal
SUNRISERS HYDERABAD: Martin Guptill, Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Manish Pandey, Kane Williamson (capt), Vijay Shankar, Mohammad Nabi, Yusuf Pathan, Rashid Khan, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Basil Thampi, Khaleel Ahmed