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Pretoria, April 28: Yusuf Pathan played a typical blistering knock of 62 off just 30 balls to help Rajasthan Royals humble Delhi Daredevils by 5 wickets here on Tuesday. Delhi, who were going great guns until this match, batted miserably posting a modarate 143/7 before letting Royals off the hook despite having them on the mat early(64/5 after 10 overs).
Man of the match Pathan took Delhi bowlers to the cleaners, clobbering six sixes and remaining unbeaten in the process. His dominance was so huge that Graeme Smith’s 46-ball 44-run knock went almost unnoticed.
The South African captain held the fort from the one end, waging a lone battle in the begging for Rajasthan Royals who were struggling at 64/5 after 10 overs. But it was Yusuf Pathan-show in Centurion Park once the burly Baroda batsman came to the crease. Pushed to the wall, Pathan launched a counter-attacking effort, a approach which some Pundits suggest is the best way to get out of any kind of trouble.
A batsman with immense strength and tremendous will-power, Pathan never took a single step backward, throwing every caution out of the window and in the process inflicting the first defeat on the formidable Delhi Daredevils in the tournament. It’s for purely his effort that Royals won the match with 9 balls to spare.
Amit Mishra, who came up with another brilliant bowling performance with 3/34, must consider himself unlucky to be on the losing side as his team-mates keep grassing catches and leaking runs in the match.
Smith, who anchored the innings and remained not on 44 with five fours, was dropped on 19.
Chasing a moderate 144, Rajasthan Royals started off poorly as they lost two quick wickets losing Rob Quiney for only 4 and then Swapnil Asnodkar for 11.
A B de Villiers continued his imperious form in IPL as he played a 50-run knock off 40 balls. He, in company of Daniel Vettori, played sensible cricket to help Delhi cross 100 marks in 15th over of the match despite losing 4 top-order batsmen early in the innings.
Delhi Daredevils’ strong batting line-up today suffered a serious jolt in the tournament for the first time as they lost four wickets. After losing Sehwag & Gambhir early, the batting hero of the last match, Tilakratne Dilshan (7) and stumper Dinesh Karthik (4) also departed early.
Shane Warne may have quit international cricket to become a poker player, but has not lost his old magic with the ball. The way he has been bowling in the IPL-2 is a testimony to his greatness which does not require routine practice at nets. Coming into bowl his first over of the match, he bamboozled Dinesh Karthik, who played a false shot to give a simple catch to the master bowler. Delhi, at that time, found themselves in precarious situation losing four wickets with the scoreboard had reached only 49.
Electing to bat first on a seemingly batting track, Delhi Daredevils’ slambang opening pair of Virender Sehwag and Gautam Gambhir again failed to provide a good start to their team as the got out in the 3rd over of the match delivered by Dimitri Mascarenhas. It’s the third straight match in which the famed opening pair failed to come good.
The duo started off beautifully in IPL as they added 58 runs in just 4.5 overs against Kings XI Punjab. But after that this famed pair has put together partnerships of 0 against Chennai Super Kings, 11 against Bangalore Royal Challengers and 20 here.
Gambhir first got out caught brilliantly by Shane Warne at slip off Dimitri Mascarenhas for just 8. But Virender Sehwag remained unfazed by the loss of his opening partner and again went for an expansive shot which went miles in the sky. Young Kamran Khan took a well-judged catch at mid-off to send Sehwag back. Sehwag made 16 off 11 balls with town fours and a huge six.
Daredevils opted for same combination that played the last match against Royal Challengers on last Sunday while Royals included Paul Valthaty in place of Abhishek Raut.
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