Murali Vijay showed what he is capable of, a couple of days ago against Royal Challengers Bangalore at the M A Chidambaram Stadium. Today, he did even better as he bludgeoned a 56-ball 127 to power Chennai Super Kings to a record IPL total of 246 for 5 in 20 overs against Rajasthan Royals here today.

Chennai smashed 157 runs in the last 10 overs as Vijay batted beautifully and hit big. Vijay smashed eight fours and 11 sixers as the Rajasthan bowlers including the fiery Shaun Tait and his Aussie compatriot Shane Watson playing his first game in IPL-III came in for severe punishment.

Albie Morkel too came to the party too, scoring a superb 62.

Chennai wasted little time in drafting in the Australian left-arm quick Doug Bollinger, who recently joined the squad after completing a satisfying Test series in New Zealand. Much has been made of Chennai's weakness in the fast-bowling stakes and Bollinger is a valuable addition having done well during the Champions League Twenty20 in India last year. Bollinger replaced Sri Lanka's Thilan Thushara, Manpreet Gony was dropped for Sudeep Tyagi, and Aniruddh Srikanth came in for C Ganapathy, who bowled an expensive over on debut two days ago.

For Rajasthan, the big news was the return of star allrounder Shane Watson. He slotted straight into the opening slot alongside Michael Lumb and Adam Voges, who performed well in the few games he got, made way. Shaun Tait, after bleeding runs against Delhi, kept his place but Siddharth Trivedi and Paras Dogra went out. They were replaced by Srikant Wagh and Abhishek Raut.

Brief scores: Chennai Super Kings: 246 for 5 in 20 overs (Murali Vijay 127, Albie Morkel 62, Shane Watson 2 for 47).