KKR cut down RCB
Andre Russell came up with another sensational display of power hitting to fire Kolkata Knight Riders to a five-wicket win over Royal Challengers Bangalore in an Indian Premier League match in Bengaluru yesterday.
Needing 66 runs off 24 balls, Kolkata were up against it before Russell came in and smashed an unbeaten 48 off 13 balls to complete the job with five balls to spare.
Russell's brutal hitting came after Virat Kohli (84 off 49) and AB de Villiers (63 off 32) recreated their "magic" with a delightful 108-run stand to take Bangalore to 205 for three.
Kolkata were kept alive in the chase through opener Chris Lynn (43 off 31), Robbie Uthappa (33 off 25) and Nitish Rana (37 off 23) before Russell singlehandedly got the job done in the death overs.
Earlier, Kohli and de Villiers hammered the bowlers at will during their entertaining stand. At one stage, it seemed Bangalore would get close to 250 but Kolkata did well to pull things back a bit.
Kohli also overtook Suresh Raina to become the leading run-getter in IPL history besides completing 8000 runs in T20 cricket.
SCORES IN BRIEF
Bangalore: 205 for 3 in 20 overs (Kohli 84, De Villiers 63; Rana 1-22, Yadav 1-31)
Kolkata: 206 for 5 in 19.1 overs (Russell 48 not out, Lynn 43; Negi 2-21, Saini 2-34)
Result: Kolkata won by 5 wickets.
Player-of-the-match: Andre Russell.
