Shreyas Gopal hat-trick: Twitter was exhilarated to see Rajasthan Royals leg-spinner grabbing a hat-trick against Royal Challengers.
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During the 49th match of the ongoing 12th season of the Indian Premier League between Royal Challengers Bangalore and Rajasthan Royals at Bengaluru, Rajasthan Royals leg-spinner Shreyas Gopal registered a hat-trick to bring back his team back into the match.
In what was a rain-curtailed five-over fixture, Gopal was introduced into the attack in the second over. With RCB opening batsmen in Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers scoring 23 runs off the first over bowled by Varun Aaron, Royals needed Gopal to dismiss either one of them to control the run-flow.
With him dismissing as many as three batsmen, RR were right into the match. Continuing from the first over, Kohli scored a six and four to force the attack on the opposition. However, his attempt to clear the straight boundary saw him getting caught at long-on. Before getting out, Kohli ended up scoring 25 (7) with the help of one four and three sixes.
On the next ball, de Villiers’ attempt of clearing the off-side boundary saw him hitting the ball high into air. With Royals rookie cricketer Riyan Parag not making an error on the field, de Villiers walked back to the pavilion after scoring 10 (4) with the help of two fours.
With Kohli and de Villiers back in the hut, Royal Challengers needed their overseas batsmen to play Gopal’s over. Having said that, all-rounder Marcus Stoinis tried to clear mid-off on his first ball but ended up giving a simple chance to Royals captain Steven Smith.
How Twitter reacted:
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