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Durban: Yuvraj Singh may not have repeated his six-sixes feat here but he rolled his arm over to take a hat-trick, the first of IPL2, appearing to put Kings XI Punjab firmly in the driver’s seat against the Royal Challengers.
But he hadn’t accounted for wily veteran and new Royal Challengers skipper Anil Kumble, who took two for 25 to helped Vijay Mallya’s boys clinch a thrilling eight-run victory.
Kings XI needed 17 off the last two overs but Kumble, bowling the 19th, varied his pace beautifully to take the wicket of Kumar Sangakkara, who was threatening to win it for Preity Zinta’s team. He gave away only four runs and Praveen Kumar admirably rose to the occasion in the final over to help Royal Challengers post a much-needed win.
Kumble was brilliant in the way he led the team. He made the right bowling changes and was at the top of his own game. His opposite number, Yuvraj (50 off 34 balls), opening the batting, was also looking in fantastic touch but Kumble, after being hit for two sixes, removed the left-hander to bring the Royal Challengers back into the game.
Wickets then fell at regular intervals and once Praveen Kumar removed Irfan Pathan in the final over, it was all over for Kings XI.
Earlier, it was all going well for the Royal Challengers when Yuvraj turned it around in the last two balls of the 11th and the first ball of the 12th over as Royal Challengers struggled to 145. Uthappa tried to heave Yuvi to give a catch at the deep, Kallis couldn’t read the one that came in with the arm Boucher played for the turn to be caught in front.
Brief Score: Royal Challengers Bangalore 145/9 (van der Merwe 35, Abdulla 4-36, Yuvraj 3-22) beat Kings XI Punjab 137/7 (Yuvraj 50, Praveen 2-27, Kumble 2-25) by eight runs.
