Another humiliating loss for under-fire Bangalore
It could not have gone worse for Bangalore. With Rahul Dravid's men facing the heat from all corners, a nine-wicket thrashing by Mohali in game 34 of the Indian Premier League here on Monday meant that Bangalore's run in the competition is now bordering on humiliation.
Bangalore's meager 143-run total was never going to be challenging enough but Shaun Marsh's blistering 51-ball knock handed out an embarrassing defeat to the visitors as Mohali galloped to their target in the 16th over.
In their previous encounter too, Mohali had cantered home, drubbing Bangalore by six wickets at the Chinnaswamy stadium one week ago.
On a decent pitch, the Bangalore batsmen showed momentary sparks but it never came together for them. Virat Kohli and Misbah-ul-Haq flowed for a brief period while Mark Boucher and Dravid displayed grit but it was never going to be enough.
It was the combination of Indian bowlers and Aussie batsmen, which worked like a charm for Mohali. After S Sreesanth (3-29) and company restricted Bangalore to 143-8, the Aussie trio of Marsh, James Hopes and Luke Pomersbach flayed the bowlers to take Mohali to the top of the points table below Jaipur.
The impressive Marsh brought up another half-century as he smashed the deflated Bangalore attack to all corners of the ground, bludgeoning nine boundaries and two sixes in his unbeaten 74. He, along with Hopes, took the home side off to a steady start before Hopes departed for 27.
In a surprise move, Pomersbach was sent at number three and in his first game in the tournament, he blazed an unbeaten 24-ball 34, which included three boundaries and two sixes.
Pomersbach and Marsh added an unbroken 112-run stand in less than 10 overs as the duo took the Bangalore bowling to the cleaners. Marsh was particularly severe on the visitors spearhead, Dale Steyn, pounding him ruthlessly for 33 runs in his two overs.
Earlier, Mohali bowlers refused to give an inch to Bangalore as the visitors failed to get any momentum going for a sizable passage. Regular wickets pegged them back and despite cameos by Misbah-ul-Haq and Virat Kohli and some solid rearguard action by skipper Dravid and Mark Boucher, the beleaguered Bangalore team never had control over the proceedings in the middle.
After electing to bat, they lost J Arun Kumar as early as the third over with four runs on the board. Desperate for a win to stay alive in the competition, Bangalore threw in Misbah early at the opposition, hoping the Pakistan batsman may repeat his T20 heroics and script a turnaround for them.
And Misbah looked determined to play with the long handle as he went after the young Mohali bowlers. Along with Virat kohli, Misbah put on 32 runs for the second wicket in just 16 balls, perhaps the brightest part of the game for Bangalore.
The 33-year old, replacing the out of form Shivnarine Chanderpaul in the eleven, started belting the ball as soon as stepped out. The Pakistan star batsman smashed three boundaries and one six in his eight-ball 21 before he went on the back-foot to Sreesanth a tad too much to dislodge the bails with his right leg.
Piyush Chawla foxed Kohli, who looked in fine touch, in his first over as the leg-spinner cleaned up India's under-19 skipper for a well-made 21.
Craig White, the only batsman to have two hundreds in T20, hung around for a while looking like a shadow of the reputation he came with in the competition. White tried to break the shackles with a wild heave off Chawla after making a sedate 10 only to give a skier, which the bowler pouched superbly running back.
And Bangalore were restricted to 74-4 and it was left once again to Dravid and Mark Boucher to bring some respectability to the total. But after Dravid fell for 29, everything fell apart for them as they added only 41 runs in the last five overs.
Bangalore will now be playing for pride more than anything else in the tournament as their chances of qualifying to the semi-final is improbable.