'Lord Shardul' trends on social media again after the bowler scalps two wickets in one over

CSA Provincial T20 | Titans, Knights, South Western Districts, Western Province enter quarter-finals

With the group stage of matches finished for the First Division teams, the Cricket South Africa Provincial T20, the domestic T20 tournament and also the season opener of South Africa’s cricket summer of 2021-22, the four quarter-final berths have been confirmed. In the new set-up of Domestic cricket in South Africa, the franchise set-up was discontinued from the 2021-22 season, and all 15 provinces of the South African nation got representation in a two-division List A and First class system and unified T20 competition. Thus the CSA Provincial T20 Knockout competition is that unified tournament. In this tournament, the eight First Division teams were segregated into two groups of A and B with four teams each while the seven Second Division teams along with South Africa Under-19 unit were pooled together in Group D which was further segregated into two sections. Four teams from First Division groups have qualified for the Quarter Finals and will play against each other while two teams each from the two sections of Group D will also reach the quarterfinals and face each other to make it to the Semi-Finals. It is only in the semi-finals that the teams from the First and Second divisions will clash. The tournament started on September 24 with Grup A games where four teams namely, Western Province, Highveld Lions, Northern Cape Heat and South Western Districts faced each other in a single round-robin format. At the end of the round, three teams i.e. Western Province, Lions and South Western Districts had eight points each from two wins, but due to better runs rate, only Western Province and South Western Districts made it to the quarterfinals. The Group B matches started on September 28 with four teams namely, Knights, Titans, Kwazulu-Natal-Inland and Mpumalanga Rhinos faced each other in the round-robin format. The matches were disturbed by rain gods and as a result, while a game between table-toppers knights and last placed Rhinos had to be cancelled, the game between Titans and Rhinos was decided on the Duckworth-Lewis-Stern method and Titans won it by nine runs to become the second team along with Knights to qualify for the quarterfinals. In the quarterfinals, these four teams will now face each other with Knights, the toppers of Group B taking on the second-placed team from Group A Western Province in quarterfinal-3 and Group A topper South Western Districts facing Titans from Group B in quarterfinal-1. Winners from these quarterfinals will then collide with winners from quarterfinals 2 and 4, teams for which are yet to be decided.

IPL 2021 | DC vs CSK: Dhawan continues to knock selectors' doors; unleashes another batting masterclass

The Indian selectors made some surprising calls when they picked up the squad for the World T20 and one of these was the omission of opening batsman Shikhar Dhawan. The left-handed batsman is now putting some more pressure on the selectors with the way he is batting in the on-going Indian Premier League. Dhawan has notched up more than 490 runs in 13 matches that he has played for Delhi Capitals and unleashed another masterclass on Monday when he took on CSK’s Deepak Chahar in one of the overs during the 137-run chase against the MS Dhoti-led side in Dubai. The opening batsman gathered 21 runs in the fifth over of the innings that was being bowled by Chahar. More than the runs, it was about the variety of strokes that caught everyone’s eye. He came down the track on the first ball that was bowled full, outside off and played it over mid-on for a maximum and followed it with a four towards the backward square region. The left-hander then played a late-cut on the back of the length delivery to collect another boundary while charged down to smoke the fourth ball over long off for a maximum. The penultimate ball was a dot delivery while Dhawan took an easy single towards the long on the last ball. Batting first, CSK managed to put 136/5 in 20 overs after riding on Ambati Rayudu’s unbeaten 43-ball 55 during the course. Axar Patel scalped a couple of wickets for DC at the cost of 18 runs in 4 overs while R Ashwin and Kagiso Rabada also returned with impressive figures. Ashwin picked up a wicket for 20 runs in his 4 overs while Rabada didn’t get any wickets but bowled an economic spell to return with figures of 0/21 in 4 overs. The BCCI treasurer Arun Dhumal has cleared that there will be no changes in the World T20 squad but the board still has time till October 10, 2021 to make the tweaks if it wants to.

IPL 2021 | RR vs MI: As the race for playoffs intensifies, Mumbai face Rajasthan

Rajasthan Royals batsmen were on a roll against the Chennai Super Kings after they chased down a target of 190 runs in the 18th over and by 7 wickets in Abu Dhabi. While openers Yashasvi Jaiswal and Evin Lewis gave a perfect and brisk start to the team, Shivam Dube capitalised on it pretty well and helped his side take two crucial points. RR are riding high on confidence after demolishing the CSK bowling unit and will now lock horns with Mumbai Indians on Tuesday in Sharjah. MI on the other hand, haven’t really played the kind of cricket they are known for and the points table talks about how the Rohit Sharma-led side has fared in this edition especially in the second leg. In 12 matches that they have featured, Mumbai have suffered defeats in seven of them. The batting order failed to fire in the last match against Delhi Capitals as they were restricted to 129/8 in 20 overs. Though, the bowlers did start off the proceedings on a positive note but the lack of runs on the board made them see another loss in this edition. Talking about the previous match between the two teams, MI won that game by 7 wickets after chasing down a target of 172 in the 19th over. The two sides would want to clinch a win in this match to stay alive in the playoffs race. Match Details Rajasthan Royals vs Mumbai Indians, Match 51 Venue: Sharjah Cricket Stadium, Sharjah Date & Time: October 5th at 7:30 PM IST, and at 6:00 PM local time Live Streaming: Star Sports Network and Disney+Hotstar Pitch Report The pitch during the previous game between RCB and PBKS at the venue looked relatively better for batting but this was one of the rare instances when the batters were on the dominant side. The batsmen will have to get their eye in before going for aggressive strokes. So, if you win the toss, elect to bat and try to put up a good total on the board. Rajasthan Royals riding high on confidence In sports, it is said that a single performance can do wonders for a player or a team and RR probably unleashed that in the previous encounter against Chennai Super Kings when their batsmen were on song and unveiled a brutal assault on the Super Kings bowlers. While openers Jaiswal and Lewis have proved their worth, Shivam Dube was one of those batsmen who needed to chip in an innings of the sorts that he played against Chennai. The left-handed batsman’s body language spoke volumes about the confidence he had while batting on that particular day. If these four batters continue to do so, RR can certainly dominate MI especially with the likes of David Miller, Glenn Phillips and Rahul Tewatia to follow. MI’s struggle to fill the voids Who could have thought that five-time champions would be tottering down the points table and depend upon other teams’ results to figure out their playoffs scenario. But it is how it is. Mumbai Indians have been struggling to get any form in this season. The batsmen haven’t gone all guns blazing and as a result, the side has failed to put runs on the board. But one of the most important factors of MI’s dismal show is Kieron Pollard’s form especially with the bat. Barring one game in the second leg, the West Indies all-rounder hasn’t really played that “Pollard” calibre innings. The right-hander needs to get into the groove if Mumbai are looking for any positive results else it won’t take much for them to bow out of the tournament. Probable XI Rajasthan Royals: Evin Lewis, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Sanju Samson (c & wk), Shivam Dube, Glenn Phillips, David Miller, Rahul Tewatia, Mayank Markande, Chetan Sakariya, Kartik Tyagi, Mustafizur Rahman Mumbai Indians: Rohit Sharma (c), Quinton de Kock (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Saurabh Tiwary, Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard, Krunal Pandya, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Jayant Yadav, Trent Boult, Jasprit Bumrah Fantasy XI Sanju Samson (c), Rohit Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav (vc), Evin Lewis, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Kieron Pollard, Shivam Dube, Jasprit Bumrah, Mustafizur Rahman, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Chetan Sakariya

IPL 2021 | Ripal Patel makes IPL debut for DC, Robin Uthappa for CSK

In a fresh change, Delhi Capitals gave Ripal Patel a chance to make his debut in the Indian Premier League having bought him in the February 2021 auctions. On the other hand, Chennai Super Kings for the first time in many years rested Suresh Raina for an IPL game as another experienced player Robin Uthappa made his way for the first time to the Yellow Army’s playing XI. Ripal, who replaced Steve Smith in the Playing XI, has played only 11 T20s and nine List A games before he got the opportunity on such a huge platform. In the 11 T20s, he has scored 191 runs at an average of 31 and a strike rate of more than 189. His ability to strike hard is the reason why the 26-year-old Gujarat batter has been drafted into the team. This is also the first time in this year’s IPL that a team is going with only three overseas players in their XI against a quota of four. Uthappa, who is a veteran of 189 games, played for Rajasthan Royals last year and was transferred to the CSK in an all monetary deal. He has to his credit 4607 IPL runs at an average of 27 and strike rate of 130 and was a key figure in KKR’s two title-winning seasons.