Delhi Capitals beat Kolkata Knight Riders in a run fest. Delhi scored 228 batting first with captain Shreyas Iyer making unbeaten 88 off just 38 balls.
PERFORMERS OF THE DAY
DELHI CAPITALS Bat: Shreyas Iyer 88*(38) Prithvi Shaw 66(41) Bowl: Anrich Nortje 4-0-33-3 Harshal Patel 4-0-34-2
KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS Bat: Nitish Rana 58(35) Eoin Morgan 44(18) Bowl: Andre Russell 4-0-29-2
AS IT HAPPENED
KKR won the toss and elected to field first. The decision looked inspired by what had happened in the previous game of RR vs KXIP in Sharjah. Delhi came into bat and they had a decent start. Shikhar Dhawan hit a few cracking shots before he fell to Varun Chakravarthy on the penultimate ball of the powerplay. Delhi were scoring just under 10 RPO till this point. They were 57/1 after the powerplay.
Captain’s Carnage
Captain Shreyas Iyer hit 6 sixes in his innings of 88. He stringed together a 78 run partnership with Prithvi Shaw who scored 66. The ball was flying over the ropes and KKR never looked like stopping Delhi.
The finishing touch was provided by Pant who scored 38 off 17 balls. The only KKR bowler who looked in control was Andre Russell. He gave just 29 runs in his 4 overs where the other bowlers were going for over 10-12 RPO
The On-Off Chase
KKR’s chase never really got going at any stage of the game. It was not off to a great start as Narine perished early to Nortje. Rana and Gill tried to steady the ship but a couple of good overs from Mishra and Ashwin added on the pressure. Gill departed trying to slog one off Mishra.In comes Russell. He smashed a four and a six off Rabada and Rabada responded by taking his wicket.Wickets kept falling for KKR and no one really stood up for them with an innings of longevity. Eoin Morgan and Rahul Tripathi lit some hopes when they smashed 40 runs in 8 deliveries. But the resurgence was undone when Morgan got out. Delhi won by 18 runs and Shreyas Iyer was the Man Of The Match.
CAPTAINCY ERRORS BY KKR
KKR captain Dinesh Karthik took some stark decisions yesterday. The decision to bowl Chakravarthy in the powerplay and the 19th over backfired. What was even more shocking was that Eoin Morgan came into bat at 6. He did all he could with whatever deliveries he had. Thirdly, Rahul Tripathi came in to bat after Pat Cummins. Cummins hit 4 sixes in the Bumrah over but surely one would think that a specialist batsman should supersede a bowler who can bat.
ONE FAILS, THE OTHER STEPS UP
Rabada had an off day but it was his South African partner who took the center stage. Nortje took 3 wickets with an economy of 8.2 RPO. Mishra bowled miserly giving just 14 from the 2 overs that he bowled. Why didn’t be bowl more is debatable. Delhi now sits comfortably at the top of the table with 6 points.
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