#559 Liverpool continue their dream run in Champions league, to face Real Madrid in finals who are 1 win away from hatrick champions league titles; Nadal JUST-CAN’T-BE-BEATEN-IN-CLAY in 2018; RCB finally found a bowling unit who can defend a target; Southee and Siraj star in win vs MI; Pant keeps DD hopes alive; Rashid Khan keeps winning games for SRH; Dhoni and Watson continue to excel for CSK; Surya,Rohit and Bumrah keep MI hopes alive with brilliant win over Punjab XI and more..:-)
In Champions league 2nd leg SF, Real Madrid, Bayern Munich scored in 3rd minute itself to take aggregate to 2-2. But Real Madrid bounced with goals by Benzema to take aggregate to 4-2 by half time. Bayern Munich played their heart out in 2nd half. Real Madrid were made to sweat by each move by Bayern Munich. Rodrigues reduced aggregate gap to 4-3. But that was where it ended. Real Madrid thanks to their brilliant defense reached their consecutive finals of Champions league. They would face Liverpool in finals who beat Roma 7-6 in aggregate. Liverpool tool 2-1 lead by half time to take aggregate to 7-3. Roma scored thrice in 2nd half to give Liverpool some tense moments. But Liverpool managed to reach finals for the first time since 2007.
Nadal continued his dream run in Barcelona open. He beat Goffin 6-4 6-0 (thereby winning 400th match in clay !!) in SF and thrashed Tsitsipas 6-2 6-1 in finals to grab his 11th Barcelona open. He has won 46 sets and 19 matches in a row in clay. This is staggering stat. He became first player to win 400 matches min in both clay and hard court. Legend in his own right.
CSK faced MI in Mumbai. CSk just managed 169-6 in 20 overs. Raina starred with 75 from 47 balls but it like CSK were 20 runs short. Once Surya and Lewis had 69 run opening stand, it was clear MI would win with ease. Rohit hit his 2nd IPL 2018 fifty to give Mi 8 wicket win. RR hosted SRH in Jaipur. SRH were cruising at 109-1 in 14th over thanks to great hitting by Hales and Williamson. But they had collapse post that and just managed 151. RR were cruising at 72-1 in 10th over. But Samson got out, RR fell apart. Stokes batting form has been poor in this year’s IPL. Rashid and Siddarth then put the plug on RR scoring. RR won the match by 11 runs in the end. SRH have defended their 3rd successive low score. Its massive achievement considering they don’t even have Bhuvi in lineup due to injury.
RCB hosted KKR and struggled without ABD. De Kock and Mccullum had a 67 run opening stand. But post that they struggled with run rate. Kohli did some big hitting towards the end to take RCB score to 176. Once KKR dropped Narine in first over and Lynn in 3rd over, it was clear that RCB would fall short. RCB took some quick wickets to put KKr under pressure. KKR needed 43 from 4 overs. Their death bowling again fell short of expectations. KKR won with 5 balls to spare. RCB have not got their act together in any game so far. They have won 2 games solely due to ABD heroics.
CSK hosted DD in Pune. Watson was dropped early on. Post that it was all CSK. They scored a massive 211-4 in 20 overs. Watson scored a brilliant 78 and Dhoni hit 51 of 22 balls. DD were reduced to 76-4 before Pant and Shankar showed some fight but it was too steep a climb and lost eventually by 13 runs. Pant’s 79 of 45 was a brilliant knock though. RCb hosted MI in Bengaluru. Manan Vohra and McCullum again wasted good start without going for big score. RCB got 167 which looked 15 short. But RCB got this 167 mainly due to 2 blunders by MI. They bowled 2 waist high full toss which went for six. Free hit of both balls also went for six. So 26 runs came of Just 2 balls. Mclenghan gave away 24 runs in last over which also proved costly for MI. Southee gave RCB dream start by castling Ishan for golden duck. Umesh dismissed Yadav and Rohit of consecutive deliveries. MI struggled post that. Pandya brothers gave hope to RCB. 35 was needed of last 3 overs. RCB held their nerves this time by bowling mix of Yorkers and slow deliveries. RCB badly needed a win and bowlers finally won them a game. RCB won by 14 runs. T was match where RCB as a unit performed well. MI now need to win all their remaining 6 matches to reach play offs.
2nd contest between RR and DD also was reduced by rain to 18 overs a side. DD made 196-6 thanks to fifties by Pant and Shreyas. Due to another rain interruption, target as reduced to 151 in 12 overs. That was a tough ask. Butler and Short gave RR a dream start by reaching 82 in 7th over. But RR collapsed from 82-1 to 100-3. They needed 51 of last 3 overs but fell short by 4 runs. DD grab their 3rd win in IPL 2018. KKR hosted CSK. Watson and Du Plessis raced to 48-0 in 5 overs. Post that Chawla South African star. Watson and Raina took CSk to 91-1 in 10 obvers. Pos that CSK struggled to guile and variation of Narine-Kuldeep-Chawla. They just managed 177. They reached that due to another 25 ball 43 by Dhoni. Jadeja dropped Narine of 2 consecutive deliveries in 2nd over of the match. It was clear it was not CSK day. They reduced to KKR to 40-2 and 97-4. But Shubman and Dinesh Karthik had other ideas. They kept creaming balls to boundaries to take pressure off KKR. They eventually won the match with 14 balls to spare. Shubhman scored his first IPL 50 in the process. But combined effort of 32 and 2-20 by Narine was the key for KKR victory.
MI had to win all remaining 6 games. It started with facing Punjab at home.Gayle and Rahul gave Punjab a brilliant start with a 54 run stand. Punjab lost way post Rahul got out. They sent Yuvi ahead of Mayank and he took time and didn’t get any timing. Gayle got out aftera 40 ball 50. Yuvi was runout soon after. Punjab did 2nnd blunder by sending Axar ahead of Mayank and Stoinis. That backfired too. Some hitting by Stoinis, Nair and Mayank gave Punjab a score of 174. Axar and Yuvi faced 26 balls between them and just scored 27 runs. That was the difference between a 190+ score and 174. Bumrah was star for Mi with 1-19. Surya gave MI a perfect start with yet another fifty. MI were reduced to 80-1 to 120-4. They needed 50 runs of last 4 overs. Rohit and Krunal finished it off in style with some lusty hitting. MI won by 6 wickets with 1 over to spare.
