Rajasthan Royals sprung a surprise on Royal Challengers Bangalore at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium, Jaipur. The Jaipur-based team managed to defeat the Southern team by 30 runs and thus knocked them out of the competition. Rajasthan Royals now have a chance to qualify for playoffs if other results go their way. RCB’s campaign has come to a sad end and they have nothing to look forward to.

RCB began the chase of 165 very well. In fact, at one stage, they were thinking about chasing the total within 16 overs which would have boosted their net run-rate ahead of that of Mumbai’s. Virat Kohli succumbed to the spin of K Gowtham but the ABD at number three and the other opener Parthiv kept the run-rate flowing.

The boundaries were coming regularly for Royal Challengers Bangalore with both ABD and Parthiv going all guns. Rahane then introduces leg spin into the match and the balance now tilted towards RR. RCB with 75/1 at one stage was thriving towards the target.

Shreyas Gopal then broke the partnership as he took the wicket of Parthiv Patel, he went back for 33(21), Last match’s hero Moeen Ali fell in the same over. Gopal and Sodhi then combined to pick up the wickets of Grandhomme and Mandeep Singh in their respective overs. Only ABD was left now.

On 4th ball of the 13 over, Gopal managed to slip in a googly through the defense of AB De Villiers, bemused ABD had his foot hanging in mid-air when Klaasen whipped the bails off. RCB crashed down to 98/6 from 75/1. The severe blows punctured the team and its hopes of playing in the playoffs.

Soon enough, Rajasthan managed to clean out the RCB team and scored a victory by 30 runs. Shreyas Gopal was the pick of the bowlers with his bowling figures of 4/16 in his four overs.