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IPL 3 : BANGALORE BEAT PUNJAB

Royal Challengers Bangalore beat Kings XI Punjab by six wickets. Irresponsible fielding by Kings XI Punjab and a series of dropped catches cost them the match. Kings XI Punjab won the toss and chose to bat against Royal Challengers Bangalore on Friday at the PCA Stadium, Mohali.

Shaun Marsh and Manvinder Bisla opened the innings but Marsh was caught by Dravid off the bowling of Vinay Kumar after scoring only 2 runs. Dravid has a reputation of having the safest pair of hands in the slip region.

Bisla was bowled by Kumble in trying to scoop the ball. Bopara came to the crease at the fall of second wicket . He played a scintillating knock of 42 (not out) punctuated with three boundaries. Yuvraj Singh also contributed a quick fire 36 but was out caught Cameron b by Jacques Kallis. He slammed two huge sixes and three fours in his 20 ball 36 runs. Irfan Pathan was later run out for 16 runs.

Royal Challangers Bangalore have retained the same XI that lost to Chennai Super Kings two days ago.

Royal Challengers Bangalore have been given a target of 182 runs to win this match and they opened their innings with Manish Pandey and Jacques Kallis. Jacques Kallis was the first to go back to the pavilion with the score reading at 28 for 1.

Manish Pandey was run out for 29 runs. Thereafter Kevin Pietersen and Virat Kohli held the fort for the Royal Challangers and they took the game away from Kings XI Punjab. Virat Kohli was out after contributing a valuable 42 runs and the Royal Challangers Bangalore score read 130 for 3.

Robin Uthappa came to the crease at the fall of Virat Kohli and was dropped on the very first ball by Bopara who let the ball slip off his hands, otherwise it would have been two wickets off 2 balls.

The 17th over of the innings was sent down by Bret Lee and he was hammered for 25 runs. That single over changed the equation for the Kings XI Punjab and then 24 runs were needed off 18 deliveries. Kevin Pieterson slammed his half century and struck two succesive boundaries. Robin Uthappa edged the ball fron Pathan and was out caught by wicket-keeper Bisla. He slammed 22 off 8 deliveries only and can be termed as the victory knock for the R.C.Bangalore.

Royal Challangers Bangalore needed only 3 runs to win off the last over and Pieterson hit the winning boundary. Bangalore won the match by 6 wickets.

The award for the maximum sixes went to Robin Uthappa.

The award for the Karbon Kamaal Catch went to Rahul Dravid.

The Man of the match award was given to Kevin Pietersen.