East meets South when Kolkotta Night Riders host Bangalore Royal Challengers in the battle of the basement at the Eden Gardens this coming Thursday. Both these sides are in the catchment region of the IPL league table with only two victories each and will need to come up with something spectacular if they are to live up to their billing as pretournament favourites and secure a place in the semi-finals.

Kolkotta Night Riders have gone flat since winning their first two matches with pomp and are on a heavy losing streak. The tigers from Bengal are probably the poorest outfit in the league in terms of form and have lost their last four matches on a trot. Their last defeat came in a close contest against the Punjab Royals when they managed to make a meal out of dead rubber only to end up losing the clash by nine runs. The batting has looked poor with Sourav Ganguly looking like an outcast in the fastest, fittest and smallest version of the royal game. On the positive side, David Hussey has been a real plus to them so has youngster Saha and the Kolkotta outfit will need both of them to be at their finest form when they came up against a strong Bangalore Royals bowling line up. However, the real trump card for Shah Rukh Khan's outfit will be the availability of fast bowler Sohaib Akthar for this clash. The Rawalpinid express has been cleared to play in this tourney despite being banned from international cricket for five long years and he will be itching to prove his detectors wrong with a fiery spell against the Bangalore Royal Challengers in front of a baying crowd of over a hundred thousand.

Bangalore Royal Challengers have looked sloppy and ill fit all through the tournament and it came as no surprise when they lost out to Punjab Kings XI in their last clash at home. Rahul Dravid 's fine sixty six came to no effect as a top order batting collapse meant that they could only manage a meagre 140 against one of their strongest batting line-ups around. To compound Dravid's problems, the absence of pro hitter Ross Taylor for this clash due to international commitments means that the likes of Jacques Kallis and 20-20 specialist Cameron White will have to be at the peak of their poweress when they face up against a steaming Sohaib Akthar. Bangalore Royal Challengers faced their opponents of this match back on the inaugural day of the IPL tournament and they were ripped apart by a smashing 158 by Brendon Mcculum. With the long sixes and smashing fours still bouncing in the minds of the Bangalore Royal Challengers, Vijaya Mallaya's outfit will be gunning for revenge when they come up against Kolkotta Night Riders this coming Thursday 8th of May 2008 at the Eden Gardens. Watch this match of the exciting Indian Premier League here, the premium cricketing portal. Keep track of all the latest Bangalore Royal Challenger scores with the RSS scorecard that updates instantaneously so that you don't miss any live Kolkotta Knight Riders cricket scores. Alternatively, you can view all the latest Bangalore Royal Challengers cricket action in funny flashed based animations on our flash based scorecards. Hear the opinion of experts on the current performance of the Kolkotta Knight Riders cricket performances with our audio commentary portal that is a much better alternative for those without bandwidth to view live Kolkotta Knight Riders cricket streamed online.

Tag :- Bangalore royal Challengers   Eden Gardens   Kolkotta Night riders   Punjab Kings XI