Royal Challengers Bengaluru 202 for 4 (Ghosh 64*, Perry 57, Ahuja 30*, Gardner 2-33) beat Gujarat Giants 201 for 5 (Gardner 79, Mooney 56, Renuka 2-25) by six wickets

A run-fest that produced the highest aggregate as well as the highest successful chase in the WPL ended with defending champions Royal Challengers Bengaluru chasing down 202 in a canter in Vadodara.

RCB maintain an early leash

Renuka Singh struggled for accuracy in her first two overs, but her first attempt at bowling stump-to-stump rather than searching for devious inswing led to Laura Wolvaardt being bowled for 6 in the fifth over. D Hemalatha came in at N0. 3 for Giants rather than Harleen Deol, and they were two down when she sliced the offspinner Ahuja to point. Giants were 41 for 2 in the seventh.

Mooney ups the ante

Gardner takes charge

At the other end, Gardner continued from where she had left off at the Women's Ashes earlier in the month by taking toll of Rawat's inexperience and hitting her for three consecutive sixes. After hitting the first two over long-off and long-on, she pummelled the half-tracker that followed over deep backward square leg.

Gardner was able to sustain this momentum against Wareham in the following over when she hit her for back-to-back fours. The Dottin-Gardner partnership had surged to 63 off 26 balls when Perry dropped a set Dottin at long-on, but it wouldn't cost RCB much as she fell four balls later.

Gardner ended the innings in a blaze, taking down the teenaged seamer VJ Joshita as Giants hit 49 off the last three overs. Garner's innings was studded with three fours and eight sixes.

Giants turn sloppy after Gardner's big strike

Gardner came into this match having dismissed Mandhana more often than any other bowler in T20s, and the head-to-head now gained a ninth dismissal. After starting the innings with back-to-back fours, Mandhana was lbw in the second over to a Gardner slider. In the same over, Danni Wyatt-Hodge fell attempting a slog on her RCB debut.

At this point, Giants turned sloppy. Left-arm spinner Tanuja Kanwar put down Perry off her own bowling in the fourth over, when she was on 2, and Deol then dropped her at long-on in the eighth over when she was on 19. In between, wicketkeeper Mooney failed to collect a throw from Simran Shaikh at midwicket when Raghvi Bist and Perry were both mid-pitch following a mix-up. Bist, on debut, was on 15 then.

RCB quickly went from 55 for 2 to 89 for 2 from overs 7 to 10.

Enter Richa Ghosh

Ghosh faced her first ball in the 12th over with RCB needing 101 off 53. That's the only ball she might have faced but for Shaikh putting down her slog-sweep at deep midwicket. But the agony of that dropped chance seemed to dissipate when Perry was out caught at long-on in the next over, leaving RCB needing 93 off 46.

It should have galvanised Giants, but things turned pear-shaped instead. The big momentum shift came in the 16th, when Ghosh clubbed Gardner for four fours and a six. A superb cocktail of muscle and finess allowed Ghosh to scythe a wide yorker between deep cover and long-off with two fielders out as easily as she slog-swept the offspinner when she fired it into her hitting arc.

The 23-run over brought the equation down to 40 off 24, at which stage Ahuja joined in the fun. Ghosh brought up her half-century off just 23 balls in the 18th. Giants were deflated, and RCB soon brought up victory with nine balls to spare.