The Chennai Super Kings returned to winning ways after they defeated the Royal Challengers Bangalore by 27 runs at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru. The visitors, who were put in to bat, posted a competitive 181 runs on the board and then restricted the hosts to 154-8. The win was CSK’s fourth in five matches and RCB’s third defeat in four outings in Pepsi IPL 2015. Earlier in the evening, the Chennai Super Kings didn’t have the best of starts losing Brendon McCullum to the leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal in the second over of the match. But they wrested back the initiative in spectacular fashion with the other opener – Dwayne Smith – and Suresh Raina taking on the RCB bowlers. Raina opened his account with a boundary, before Smith joined in the act picking up a boundary and a six off Chahal’s second over. Raina then scored consecutive boundaries in Harshal Patel’s first over before hitting David Wiese straight back over the bowler’s head. When the field restrictions were eased at the end of six overs, CSK were placed at a respectable 45 for 1. In the eighth over, Smith got stuck into Wiese picking up two sixes and a four, in the process going past 5000 T20 runs. He added one more boundary to his tally before he edged one from Patel to wicket-keeper Dinesh Karthik; he made 39 from 29 balls and hit three boundaries and as many sixes. Raina motored along to 62 from 32 balls. The left-hander got stuck into the young leg-spinner Chahal, hitting him for three successive sixes, before the attempt to send a fourth ball into orbit landed in the hands of Rilee Rossouw at long off. RCB tightened the screws thereafter. From 124 for 3 at the end of thirteen overs, CSK could only add 16 runs in the next three overs. Faf du Plessis and Dwayne Bravo picked up three boundaries between them and helped in adding 15 runs in the seventeenth over. Iqbal Abdulla picked up the wicket of Bravo in the following over, while conceding eight runs. R Ashwin and du Plessis hit a four and six respectively as 14 runs were added in the nineteenth over. Mitchell Starc bowled a fantastic over, bowling four dot balls and conceding only three runs as CSK finished their twenty overs at 181 for 8. The visitors had two notable partnerships in the innings; Smith and Raina added 58 runs in seven overs, after which the left-hander was involved in a 54-run partnership with skipper MS Dhoni. For the hosts, the two spinners were their most successful bowlers; though Chahal and Iqbal Abdulla cost plenty of runs, they picked up three wickets and two wickets respectively. Starc’s arrival certainly made a huge difference to RCB as the Australian bowled 14 dot balls in his four-over spell, conceding only 24 runs in addition to picking up a wicket. In their chase of 182, several RCB batsmen got starts, but failed to convert them to any meaningful scores. The opening pair of Rilee Rossow and Manvinder Bisla added 31 – in what would eventually be the highest partnership of the innings - before both batsmen were dismissed by Ashish Nehra in the fourth over. Dinesh Karthik added 28 runs in the company of his captain Virat Kohli before he was done in by a sensational catch by Dwayne Bravo at long on. A smart piece of glovework from MS Dhoni, who received a throw from the outfield and whipped off the bails at the striker’s end in a flash, pulled the curtains on AB de Villiers’ budding innings. Kohli played a responsible knock, holding his end up; he hit four fours and two sixes, and made 51 from 41 balls before a whip off his legs found Dwayne Smith on the ropes at midwicket. It didn’t help that his team kept losing wickets at the other end, and eventually finished the allotted twenty overs at 154-8. For CSK, Ashish Nehra was sensational with the ball yet again; the 35-year old left-armer – who clinched the Purple Cap - not only gave his team the first two breakthroughs, but also conceded no more than three runs in each of his four overs. In his final over – the 17th of the innings - he dismissed Kohli and Harshal Patel off successive deliveries, eventually finishing with career-best figures of 4 for 10. He was ably supported by Ishwar Pandey who finished with figures of one for 21 from his four overs. Brief Scores Chennai Super Kings 181-8 in 20.0 Overs (Suresh Raina 62, Yuzvendra Chahal 3-40) Royal Challengers Bangalore 154-8 in 20.0 Overs (Virat Kohli 51, Ashish Nehra 4-10) Man of the Match: Suresh Raina for his winning knock 62 of 32