The IPL finally found its Twenty20 soul, in the eighth match of this edition. For the first time in this tournament, two batsmen combined to score at a frenetic pace throughout the innings. first smashed his way to 71 off 45 deliveries, 54 of them in boundary hits. Rohit Sharma followed with a similarly quick half-century. It left a hapless Bangalore Royal Challengers 185 to chase under the Newlands lights, not an experience teams queue up in anticipation for.
The impact Gilchrist made was immediate and huge. In the first two overs, bowled by Praveen Kumar and Dale Steyn, Gilchrist's clean hitting necessitated six fielding changes, and prompted a change of angle to round the stumps from both bowlers. What was constant was Gilchrist's severity on anything erring in length. He reached 26 in the first two overs and inevitably a bowling change followed.
