Royal Challengers Bangalore were in a demolition mode on Thursday night as they swatted aside the Rajasthan Royals chasing 178 runs in just 16.3 overs, riding on opening batsman Devdutt Padikkal's maiden century in the IPL and skipper Virat Kohli's unbeaten knock of 72 runs off just 47 balls.
RCB chasing 178 runs got off to a great start owing to the 20-year old left-hander, who was off the blocks straight away. Padikkal looked in a hurry as he was hitting boundaries at will. Padikkal brought up his fifty in just 27 balls as took the centre stage and skipper Kohli played the second fiddle.
Kohli took his time initially and it helped that Padikkal was up and running straight away, which meant he took the backseat and kept milking singles and rotated the strike, rather gave him strike.
Padikkal was smashing it everywhere and raced off to 80 off just 36 balls and Kohli was just at 26 off just 24 balls and RCB were at 107 after 10 overs, cruising in their chase of the 178-run target. Kohli then took the centre stage and Padikkal took a backseat as he scored his next 24 runs off just 11 balls.
Kohli, meanwhile breached the 6000-run mark in the IPL. As Kohli was on song, Padikkal was still 11 runs away from his hundred, then he milked singles again to help the youngster get to his maiden century in the IPL and RCB made a joke of a 178-run target chasing it down in just 16.3 overs.
By the virtue of this win, RCB returned to the top of the table with eight points and still remained the only unbeaten team in the competition.
