It was just the third match of IPL 2020 but was filled with some beautiful knocks. Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) was up against Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH). It was the first match for both the teams and both of them were looking forward to grabbing the 2 points from a victory. The teams had bought up some big players in the auctions in December 2019. RCB signed an Indian youngster Devdutt Padikal after seeing his excellent performance in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy. The signing paid off as the left-handed batsman helped his team clinch the victory in an absolute thriller. The teams had faced each other 15 times, out of which eight times SRH had won, whereas RCB had won only six teams with no result in the 2017 match at Chinnaswamy stadium. Consequently, everyone was looking forward to this match.

Match Summary: Royal Challengers Bangalore vs. Sunrisers Hyderabad:

The match began as SRH won the toss and chose to bowl first. David Warner was quite confident about his bowling with Bhuvneshwar Kumar, and Sandeep Sharma opened the bowling spell. However, the match started with RCB smashing the SRH bowlers as Devdutt (56 off 42), and Finch (29 off 27) built an opening partnership of 90 runs until the last ball of the 11th over. On the very next ball, Finch was also got dismissed. Then came the RCB skipper Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers to the crease. However, Kohli got out early, but De Villiers managed to score 51 off 30 balls. His knock took the RCB total to 163-5 in the first inning, setting a target of 164 for SRH.

Now, it was time for SRH’s batting as David Warner and Jonny Bairstow walked towards the crease. Unfortunately, the SRH captain Warner (6 off 6) got dismissed in the second over itself. However, Manish Pandey (34 off 33) came in at three and handled the innings quite well until the 12th when Yuzvendra Chahal got him out. Even then, Bairstow stood hoping for the SRH team as he kept thrashing the RCB pacer. Soon enough, Chahal dismissed Jonny Bairstow (61 off 43) and on the very next ball, Vijay Shankar (0 of 1), to confirm RCB’s win in their first match. After that, the whole SRH team just collapsed as they got all-out at a total of 153 in 19.4 overs.

What does this victory say about RCB’s chances in IPL 2020?

Royal Challengers Bangalore clinched the victory after winning by ten runs. Yuzvendra Chahal was awarded the Man of the match after his brilliant spell. He took three wickets by just giving away 18 runs. However, the RCB skipper also recognized the performances of Devdutt Padikal and AB de Villiers. He gave a special mention to Chahal, of course, for his brilliant bowling. No wonder Chahal is Kohli’s go-to bowler. Now, RCB will be preparing for their next match as they are set to meet KXIP on 24th September 2020. On the other hand, SRH will be bracing themselves as they look forward to getting their first win against KKR on 26th September.