Royal Thrashing !

Deccan Chargers 184-6 (Gilchrist 71, Sharma 52) beat
Royal Challengers Bangalore 160-8 (Kohli 50) by 24 runs

The KP magic is not working. Adams mantra to keep things simple seems to spell magic. Not a day has gone by when the Challengers have not had problems with his high profile overseas problems. Dr Mallya’s blue eyed boys Ryder Taylor and KP seem to have lost the plot and have no clue how to play a “domestic ”league .(May be they are not able to catch up with their sleep thanks to the bars and pub duty that they may have to do during the nights and also ‘friends’ to hang around with over drinks .)

Looking at the last three games it seems that the buck stops at Dravid and he is left to save the match and the innings from there on . The only instance that I believe that he got some support from the batsmen is today when young Kohli helped himself to a fine half century to a losing cause .
Also in the last IPL , Dravid was one of the top scorers in the tournament but he has to be blamed for all the wrong reasons .

However , the Chargers were once again ‘clinical’ in their approach . With no changes to their side from the last match won the toss and elected to bat first with a simple philosophy to play to their strength . Gilly as expected gave the best start to the chargers and at one stage they were scoring at 12 an over . Having played 45 balls of the allotted 120 Gilly made sure that they post a challenging total and hence 184 was always going to be a tough target for the Challengers . Brilliantly complemented by Rohit’s 30 ball 52 , the young lad lived up to the promise and if these guys live up to even 50 percent to their paper record , mind you they can single handedly win the tournament if they just bowl the way they are bowling today .

Challengers woke up to the worst start they could ever imagine. Jesse Ryder bowled first ball . Infact I am told that he was dropped in the second match because of a late night drink session in one of the nearby pub inspite of the fact that he comes handy over Ross Taylor with the ball . Ryder infact took 2 wickets in the first match . But little seems to be understood by their batsmen . Their batting has completely failed in the three matches so far and they did not win the match against the royals . Infact royals threw the match and were committed to lose it .
However lot of thinking to be done by the Bangalore team folks . Good to see Dravid continuing his good form with the bat . Young and promising Kohli finally joining the party with a good fifty . Praveen Kumar playing to the expectations . Uthappa doing a decent job behind the stumps making a case strong for his International comeback .

Congratulations Gilly . New lease of life to the Chargers . Wanted Laxman to weave his wristy magic but not disappointed as there were others who took charge and worked as a Team . Fidel great job with the ball . D Ravi Teja snapping an impossible catch to send the dangerous Uthappa packing and last and the most miser RP with is 17 / 2 in 4 overs becomes the star striker for the Chargers .

Do you read the way I do ?
1. Are the chargers are shaping up to the promise and the hype which they were before the start of the IPL – 1?
2. Is the search for the third offie in form of P Ojha over? Is his performances taking him to the 20 20 tournament in couple of months time?
Well let’s follow on as the IPL has begun with its meanders and would carry on giving new shocks everyday with some serious concerns for the RC men.