Team to beat in this tournament, Delhi Capitals maintained their dominance in the Indian Premier League defeating Rajasthan Royals by 46 runs in the 23rd match of the cash-rich league. Playing at the high scoring venue of Sharjah, Rajasthan Royals capitulated once again and failed to chase down a 185-run target set by Shreyas Iyer and his men.
The top order heavy team were sent packing by the halfway point of the chase with their top three batsmen in Jos Buttler, Steve Smith and Sanju Samson failing to grab any ground. With the batting stalwarts out of the equation, Rajasthan never had enough firepower in their middle order to stage a comeback against a staunch Delhi bowling and at the end of the day lost the game by a big margin of 46 runs.
On that note, here are the three reasons why Delhi Capitals breezed past Rajasthan Royals to move to the top of the table.
Sent to bat in the first innings after losing the toss, despite scoring at a healthy rate, Delhi Capitals were struggling for momentum at the halfway stage, losing their entire top order, courtesy some awful running between the wickets.
When Hetmyer walked into the crease, Delhi had just lost Rishabh Pant in a horrendous mix-up with Marcus Stoinis and were reeling at 79/4 in 9.2 overs. Like most successful batsmen have done in this tournament, Hetmyer too took some time to settle in nodding around the first 10 odd balls. He then constructed a crucial partnership along with Marcus Stoinis to put Delhi at a place where the bowlers had something to defend in this ground.
Before he finally got out to Kartik Tyagi trying to hit him for the third consecutive six in the 17th over, Hetmyer had scored 45 off 23 balls. Returning to field later, he took two stunning catches in the boundary line to affect dismissals of Steve Smith and Shreyas Gopal.
The Rajasthan Royals top order have been in shambles for almost the entire duration of the tournament. After losing their last game against Mumbai by 59 runs, Steve Smith had said that they understand the issues and would look to gain some momentum before Ben Stokes comes into the squad. The top order has consistently failed to show up and provide Royals with the momentum they need in this tournament. But to no avail, Rajasthan scripted the same narrative once again. On the night, mainstays Steve Smith and Sanju Samson threw away their wickets when Rajasthan needed them to see the innings through and young opener Yashasvi Jaiswal barely looked comfortable during his stay at the crease.
Rajasthan would really hope that either the law of averages catches up to them, or Ben Stokes singlehandedly manages to change the fortunes of this franchise.
A target of 185 is not something that any team is unfamiliar or uncomfortable with at the Sharjah Stadium. For that matter, it was Rahul Tewatia of Rajasthan Royals who carved an incredible IPL story in this ground chasing down an impossible target 224 runs against the Kings XI Punjab on the 27th of last month.
But comeback stories are not made every day. Losing their best batsmen within the first 10 overs meant that Rajasthan had a nearly impossible task ahead of them against a team that bowled and fielded well on an everyday basis. Barring Axar Patel who bowled just 2 overs for 8 runs everyone else was amongst wickets tonight. The bowling unit frustrated the batsmen and squeezed soft dismissals out of them with Rabada being the pick of the bowlers notching up 3 wickets. However, Ravichandran Ashwin was awarded the man of the match trophy on the night for his fantastic spell of 2/22 in four overs where he picked two crucial wickets of Jos Buttler and Mahipal Lomror.
For Rajasthan Royals, it is now a tournament of survival. Most teams know their chinks in the armour and have exploited the same to win against them by huge margins in the last four games. With games coming thick and fast, Rajasthan need to turn their campaign around against the Sunrisers Hyderabad, who have not really settled in the tournament as well.
They play their next game on Sunday, 11 October and have barely any time for recovery before the doubleheader. Some might pray that the law of averages catches up to them and the team sees a turnaround in their fortunes, but at the current state, no amount of luck can help the team if they consistently keep underperforming in the tournament.
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