Sports IPL : Praveen Kumar recorded the first hat-trick of the third Indian Premier League as a dominant Royal Challengers Bangalore mauled a sorry-looking Rajasthan Royals by 10 wickets to notch up their second consecutive win in the Twenty20 tournament on Thursday.

Praveen (3-18) notched up the seventh hat-trick in the tournament's history, while skipper Anil Kumble (3-9) and Jacques Kallis (2-20) ably supported him from the other end to restrict the Rajasthan side under the three figure mark.

Delhi Daredevils' Amit Mishra, Chennai Super Kings duo of L Balaji and Makhaya Ntini, Kings XI Punjab's Yuvraj Singh (twice) and Deccan Chargers' Rohit Sharma had achieved the feat in the previous editions of the event.

With a meager 93 to chase, in-form Kallis and young Manish Pandey bulldozed the Rajsathan bowlers to all parts of the ground from the onset to complete a facile win in just 10.4 overs to register the second biggest win in terms of balls to spare in the event's history.

Kallis continued his good showing with the bat with a sparkling unbeaten 44 while Pandey blossomed in the South African's company, scoring an elegant 42.

Kallis' 34-ball essay was embellished with seven boundaries, while Pandey, the first Indian to score an IPL century last season, struck as many and a six in his entertaining 30 balls innings.

With this victory, Royal Challengers have registered two wins out of three matches they have played so far, while Rajasthan Royals have slumped to their third successive defeat in the tournament.

Royal Challengers had crushed Kings XI Punjab and lost to Kolkata Knight Riders in their earlier encounters.

Earlier, Yusuf Pathan, who was reprieved twice, showed glimpses of brilliance, scoring 26 runs off 24 balls with the help of two sixes and a four, while Martyn innings' (19 off 24) was a struggle.

Royals batting came a cropper on Thursday as after Yusuf and Martyn, only two other batsmen -- Naman Ojha (16 off 18) and Michael Lumb (10 off 18) -- could only manage double figures.

Brought back into the attack in the 17th over, Praveen first bowled Martyn of the second delivery of his third over, had Sumit Narwal brilliantly caught at square leg by Manish Pandey and then castled Paras Dogra of the next ball to the delight of the capacity crowd.

TOI PUNE: Two security guards of the Ordnance factory at Dehu Road had a fight on top of a watch tower on late Wednesday night due to which they fell down and died.

The deceased were identified as Ghissu Singh and Girishchand Sharma, both 45 years old.

Inspector Nitin Gokave of the Dehu Road police station said the guards fell down from an height of 17.5 ft on a concrete road due to which Singh died instantly while Sharma expired while undergoing treatment at the army hospital.

According to Gokave, Sharma picked up a fight with Singh for waking him up early. The dispute turned worse as they exchanged blows and in the melee both fell from the tower around 10 pm.

Another security guard, who was sleeping in the guard room, woke up on hearing a loud noise. He saw the two bodies lying on the road. The guard offered water to Singh, but he died due to severe head injuries. The guard then alerted his superiors and rushed Sharma to an army hospital in Dehu Road, where he died while undergoing treatment around 11.30 pm.

Singh was on duty between 8 pm and 10 am while Sharma's shift began at 10 pm.

The police have registered a complaint of culpable homicide not amounting to murder against the guards under section 304 of the Indian Penal Code.

TOI PUNE: A piece of history is set to float on the Mula river during the weekend. The world’s longest rowing wooden ‘eighter’ boat, a prized possession of the College of Engineering Pune’s (COEP) boat club for over 60 years, is set to be the star attraction during the college’s annual regatta here on Sunday.

The boat, which has now been refurbished by COEP students, experts and boatmen, has never been displayed or raced in any regatta since it was acquired, said Mahesh Dongare, secretary for the regatta event.

There are two such boats that are known as ‘eighters’ in the country and both are with the COEP, said Sagar Gambhir, a gold medal-winning rower from the boat club. “They were manufactured by the Salter brothers of Oxford in 1898 and brought to our club by the British in 1943-44. Since then, they have been with us. These ‘eighters’, so known because they can seat a maximum of eight rowers, are part of the rich heritage of our college,” he said.

According to Gambhir, what made the ‘eighters’ at COEP unique was that they were the only boats from their era which were still in use. “The boat is 58 feet long and is considered the world’s longest rowing wooden ‘eighter’,” he said. “We will invite our alumni to row the boat. Among them are acclaimed rowers Mangesh Kale and Pravin Bhagwat, who have won accolades at various national championships. It is a moment of great pride for us.”

TOI Sports IPL: March 16NEW DELHI: Batting first is generally a good bet on Indian pitches, especially in summers. The formula is to post a big total and then apply pressure on the opposition. But Delhi Daredevils had a different gameplan. They wanted to know how many runs they would have to chase to win the IPL game against Mumbai Indians on Wednesday.

However, the newly-laid Kotla pitch turned out to be a belter and Daredevils' decision to field first backfired. Boasting of a strong batting line-up, Mumbai Indians made the most of the good batting conditions and put up a formidable 218/7 on the board.

The hosts, also boasting of a powerful batting line-up but hamstrung by skipper Gautam Gambhir's injury, could never really threaten the target, losing wickets regularly to end up at 120 in 16.3 overs. Thus, Mumbai Indians won by a whopping 98 runs to notch up their second successive win. For Delhi, it was their first defeat in three ties.

Even as Gambhir was nursing his injury in the dressing room, his counterpart, the great Sachin Tendulkar, lit up the Delhi sky with a dazzling display of strokeplay. It was Sachin's 62 off 32 balls which gave the impetus to Mumbai innings. Young Saurabh Tiwary proved to be the perfect foil, timing the ball to a nicety.

Sachin took centrestage from the word go and there were no half measures as he played his strokes with the abandon of a rookie hand. The impressive Tiwary was not of inspiration and put up 61 off 37 balls. Ambati Rayudu, another Mumbai young gun, made a quickfire 34. Kieron Pollard, the new sensation from the Caribbean, got his first hit in the IPL but played only eight balls.

Among Delhi bowlers, only Dirk Nannes could command respect.

Gambhir, had to leave the field due to a groin injury in the second over of the day itself, did not come out to bat at all. In his absence, wicketkeeper-batsman Dinesh Karthik led the side. In Gambhir's absence, T Dilshan stepped in to open the innings with Virender Sehwag but his bad run in the tournament continued.

With the score at 56/1 after six overs, Delhi looked like putting up a good fight but Dwayne Bravo deceived Sehwag with the first ball of the seventh over and the innings simply fizzled out after that. Bravo, Harbhajan and Jayasuriya all bagged two wickets each as Mumbai Indians squeezed the life out their rivals.