Gayle's six-hitting spree

Madhusudhan Ramakrishnan18-May-2012Gayle struck 13 sixes in his innings, equalling Brendon McCullum’s record for the most sixes hit in an innings in the IPL. Gayle is the only batsman to hit eight or more sixes on four different occasions. Adam Gilchrist and Yusuf Pathan are the only other batsmen to do so on two occasions. Gayle took his tally of sixes in the IPL to 127 in just 42 matches (more than three sixes per game). Suresh Raina, who is next on the list of batsmen with the most sixes in the IPL, has 91 sixes from 78 matches.In the 2012 season, Gayle has been even more spectacular, hitting 57 sixes in 14 matches while Kevin Pietersen, who is second on the list, has hit 20 sixes in eight matches. Gayle is also the leading six-hitter overall in Twenty20 games (279 sixes), followed by Kieron Pollard, who has hit 198 sixes. Gayle also became the only batsman to score three centuries in the IPL. Before this game, he was level with Adam Gilchrist and David Warner, who have both scored two centuries each. Gayle now has eight centuries in Twenty20 matches, the most for any player. Warner is second, with five centuries. During his century, Gayle scored 82.81% of his runs in boundaries. While his tally of boundary runs (106) is the second-highest in the IPL behind that of McCullum (118), the percentage of runs in boundaries is fifth on the list (100-plus scores only). Sanath Jayasuriya is on top, with 102 of his 114 runs in boundaries (89.47%). Gayle took his series aggregate to 706 runs in 14 matches. It surpassed his tally of 608 in the 2011 season and also went past Sachin Tendulkar’s record aggregate in an IPL season (618 runs in 2010). Gayle’s aggregate is also the highest ever for a player in a Twenty20 series, surpassing Jimmy Adams’ record for Hampshire in 2010. Gayle played out a maiden over off Umesh Yadav during his century. In his previous century (against Kings XI Punjab) on May 6, 2011, Gayle played out a maiden over too. However, on the other two occasions that he played a maiden over, he failed to register a big score. Against Deccan Chargers on May 6, 2012, he was dismissed for 26 and against Kings XI on May 17, 2011, he was dismissed for a duck. The 204-run stand between Gayle and Virat Kohli is the second-highest partnership in the IPL. The highest ever stand is the 206-run partnership between Adam Gilchrist and Shaun Marsh against Royal Challengers Bangalore in the previous season. The top four partnerships in the IPL have all been second-wicket stands. Incidentally, both the double-century stands came in matches played on May 17. It is also the fourth century stand between Gayle and Kohli, the most by a batting pair in the IPL. The match aggregate (409 runs) is ninth on the list of highest aggregates in an IPL game. There have been 12 IPL games where the aggregate has exceeded 400 runs. Of the 409 runs, 276 were scored in boundaries. This is the sixth on the list of most boundary runs scored in an IPL match. The total of 215 is Royal Challengers’ fourth 200-plus score in the IPL. Chennai Super Kings and Kings XI are joint-first, with six such scores.