The crowd at the Eden Gardens were chanting RCB, RCB, RCB. And it is Faf du Plessis and his team that have qualified for the Qualifier 2 and will face RR on May 27 at Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahemdabad. They have won the Qualifier 1 by 14 runs against LSG. And with this loss, the campaign of Lucknow has ended. They lost after coming so close to the trophy.
However, KL Rahul won the toss and put RCB to bat first. They got the wicket of Du Plessis in the very first over of the innings. But Kohli and Patidar added 66 runs for the second wicket. But once Kohli got out, RCB lost two more wickets in quick succession.
However, Patidar was looking solid at the other end when Dinesh Karthik joined him. Then both batters just took the match away from the LSG. They added 92 runs off just 41 balls to reach 207/4. Patidar scored his maiden century and what a time to get it. He was unbeaten on 112* and Karthik was unbeaten on 37*.
Chasing the target, LSG lost the wicket of De Kock in the very first over. Manan Vohra (19) played some shots but got out too. But then KL Rahul and Deepak Hooda added 96 runs for the third wicket to bring Lucknow back into the chase. But once the partnership was broken, RCB took total control of the game.
In the end, the skipper tried some big shots but lost his wicket after scoring 79 off 58 balls. Eventually, Lucknow fell 14 runs short of the target. Fans also loved the performance of Royal Challengers Bangalore.