Heading into the clash in an away match against Gujarat Lions. The visiting side Royal Challengers Bangalore desperately needed a win, as it lost four of its five matches this season and had left the team at the bottom of the table.

Gujarat won the toss and opted to field first, the decision was expected as the Bangalore was missing its one of the top notch, Ab De Villiers was out of the match due to an injury.

Chris Galye and skipper Virat Kholi opened for Bangalore. When the IPL’s 10th season started, Gayle was just 67 runs short to become the first ever batsman to score 10,000 runs in T20 cricket. After having a slow start this season, scoring 32, 6 and 22 in three out of the five games, Gayle needed only 3 runs to reach the milestone.

The Jamaican roared back to form in a destructive fashion by knocking 77 off 38 balls. His heroics  were complimented by another half-century from Kholi as the captain scored 64 off 50 balls that helped Bangalore beat Gujarat by 21 runs.

The opening partnership put 122 runs, before ‘The Beast’ Gayle was finally taken down by Basil Thmapi’s yorker. Later, Kedar Jadhav added 38 runs off 16 balls and Travis Head added 30 off 16 balls taking the Bangalore’s score to 213/2 by the end of the innings.

RCB devoured the Lions in their own den, the 213 runs on the scoreboard was the highest score in this season’s IPL, so far. Even a firing performance by Kiwi great, Brendon McCullum 72 off 44 balls could not save Gujarat from Gayle’s wrath.

AMandeep