Twitter Reactions: RCB's Navdeep Saini pulls off a sensational Super Over after Kishan-Pollard carnage in Dubai

Wow! Absolutely Wow! For the second consecutive day, the match went right down the wire, and yet again, the chasing team almost pulled off a heist when 90 runs were needed in the last five overs. Ishan Kishan and Kieron Pollard were involved in a six-hitting fest and the game ended up in a tie.

Much to everyone’s surprise, despite scoring 99, Ishan Kishan wasn’t entrusted to bat with Pollard and Hardik Pandya opening in the super over. Navdeep Saini was given the chance to be the hero for his team and he lived up to its billing. Apart from a four which came off a misfield, Saini kept the batsmen at bay to go for only seven runs.

Best men were locking horns in the chase with Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers batting for RCB while, not surprisingly, Jasprit Bumrah was handed over the ball. And it goes without saying that even the super over went down the wire. Bumrah delivered his best but the runs scored earlier were too few for him. He took it to the last ball even with 8 to defend and Kohli managed to score a four when they needed a run off the last ball to finally end the day with a win.

Padikkal, Finch and De Villiers propel RCB to 201

Earlier, Virat Kohli was pretty happy to bat first after losing the toss and RCB’s opening pair proved it why. Aaron Finch rode his luck at the start and managed to get the team off to a good start. His partner Devdutt Padikkal struggled to get going but made sure to give more strike to his partner. Finch looked comfortable after early reprieves and made MI pay.

He scored 52 off just 35 deliveries with seven fours and a six as RCB added 81 runs for the opening wicket in nine overs. Kohli continued to look clueless in the middle and endured his third consecutive failure. He got out scoring only three runs off 11 deliveries. AB de Villiers came out to bat and interestingly, Padikkal took up the responsibility of upping the ante. He was not middling the ball until then at all and went on to smack James Pattinson.

The young left-hander backed off the lanky Australian to hit him for a couple of sixes in an over. It changed the momentum of the innings completely as De Villiers opened himself up. Padikkal got to his half-century before getting out in the 18th over. However, his wicket didn’t matter for RCB at all as De Villiers was set and he ended up scoring a 23-ball half-century.

Shivam Dube also scored three massive maximums to end on 27* off 10 deliveries as RCB managed to go past the 200-run mark. They eventually ended on 201/3 after 20 overs and the score seemed to be par at the halfway mark.

MI wake up from dead courtesy Kishan and Pollard

MI were always going to be under pressure in the 200+ chase. And RCB finally decided to hand the new ball to Washington Sundar. The off-spinner didn’t disappoint and ended up picking a huge wicket of Rohit Sharma. Soon Suryakumar Yadav was snaffled by Isuru Udana for a second-ball duck and the struggling Quinton de Kock also got out to Yuzvendra Chahal soon after the powerplay.

However, Ishan Kishan stood strong playing some brilliant strokes. He rotated the strike when the chips were down and also upped the ante cleverly when the partnership got going. He seemed to opening himself up with Hardik Pandya also looking good. However, Adam Zampa snapped up the latter to force for the assault from Kishan to delay.

Kieron Pollard then came on and after some time, the partnership started to build promisingly for MI. After launching a few monstrous sixes, the equation eventually came down to 90 off the last five overs even Kishan went past the 50-run mark in his first match of the season itself. This is when Pollard decided to go berserk having spent time in the middle and Adam Zampa faced the wrath of him.

When MI needed 80 off the last four overs, Zampa went for 22 runs and then Chahal was taken apart for a massive 27 runs. Pollard was 11 off 10 deliveries and at the end of 18 overs, the big West Indian had crossed his fifty in just 10 more balls much to the awe of his teammates.

Virat Kohli entrusted Navdeep Saini to deliver the penultimate over and didn’t disappoint. Apart from a six, he conceded only singles in the over to go for only 12 runs which was a huge achievement given the amount of dew in the middle. Isuru Udana, on his RCB debut, was given the responsibility to defend the runs.

The Sri Lankan did well to concede only two runs off the first two balls. However, more drama followed with Ishan Kishan hitting two massive sixes to bring it down to 5 off last two deliveries. To make things worse, Gurkeerat Singh Mann dropped a catch which propelled Kishan to 99. But then, it is IPL! More drama awaited as Kishan got out off the next ball only for Pollard to smack a short ball for four to tie the game.

After all the drama, even the super over went to the last ball and finally, RCB managed to win their second match of the season, a much needed one after their 97-run thumping in the previous outing.

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