Knight Riders Brush Aside Challengers

Knight Riders Brush Aside Challengers

Jacques Kallis hit an unbeaten century to guide the Kolkata Knight Riders to victory

©REUTERS / Action Images

Kolkata Knight Riders 171-1 (Kallis 64no) beat
Royal Challengers Bangalore 169-9 by nine wickets
Champions League Twenty20, Bangalore
Scorecard

The Kolkata Knight Riders stunned the Royal Challengers Bangalore in front of their home ground with a clinical nine-wicket Champions League Twenty20 win at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium.

The Bangalore side rallied well to score 169 for nine but they were then blown away by an unbroken 109-run stand between Jacques Kallis and Gautam Gambhir.

Kallis was unbeaten on 64 in 47 balls and Gambhir 55 in 32 deliveries as the Knight Riders charged to victory with 15 balls unused.

Gambhir hit three fours and four impressive sixes while Brad Haddin (42 in 27 balls) also put on 62 with Kallis for the first wicket to give Kolkata the perfect start to a testing run chase.

Daniel Vettori had him caught by Virat Kohli but there would be no further celebrations for the home team, who slumped to a second successive defeat.

Vettori had earlier starred with the bat, top scoring with a typically inventive and bustling 44 in 23 balls as two wickets apiece for Brett Lee, Iqbal Abdulla and Jaidev Unadkat.

Chris Gayle and Raju Bhatkal both managed to score 25 while Saurabh Tiwary made 15 but still the Challengers came up well short.

© Cricket World 2011