New Delhi: Delhi Capitals registered an important win against high-flying Rajasthan Royals to keep hopes alive in the Indian Premier League on Tuesday night.
The hosts beat the former champion by 20 runs to ensure their 6th win in 12 matches and entered inside top four in points table.
Chasing mammoth 221, Rajasthan Royals lost Yashasvi Jaiswal (4) in the first over. Jos Buttler (19) added 63 runs in 27 balls with captain Sanju Samson. Their middle order tried to keep momentum high but could not built big partnership. Riyan Parag made 27 runs from 22 while Shunham Dubey struck 25 off 12 balls followed by Rovman Powell (13). Samson played a brilliant knock of 86 runs from 46 balls with 6 sixes. They needed 29 runs from the final overs. Mukesh Kumar gave away only 8 runs to ensure the victory. They finally managed 201 in 20 overs losing 8 wickets.
Earlier, Jake Fraser-McGurk and Abishek Porel slammed fifties in contrasting fashion, while Tristan Stubbs applied finishing touches to the innings with a 20-ball 41 as the trio’s efforts propelled Delhi Capitals to reach 221/8 in 20 overs at the Arun Jaitley Stadium.
While Fraser-McGurk enthralled everyone with a 19-ball fifty, Porel found boundaries consistently to hit a 36-ball 65. It is just the eighth time that the DC openers got fifties in an IPL match. Moreover, this instance happened in New Delhi for the first time since 2015 -– when Mayank Agarwal and Shreyas Iyer hit fifties as openers.
Despite a slowdown in the middle overs, Stubbs slammed three fours and as many sixes in his 41 off 20 balls to ensure the 200 mark was breached in the first innings of an IPL 2024 game here for the fourth consecutive time.
For RR, off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin was the pick of bowlers with his 3-24. Trent Boult began by testing Fraser-McGurk from around the wicket angle and was even hit on the box once. But Fraser-McGurk ended the opening over by chipping a length ball over mid-off for six.
After Porel lofted and punched down the ground off Sandeep Sharma for a brace of fours, Fraser-McGurk brought out a lofted straight drive, slash and mishit to take a six and two fours off Boult in the third over.
Fraser-McGurk’s takedown of Avesh began in the fourth over when he got going after getting a four off an inside edge. Staying leg-side of the ball, he hammered, sliced, lofted, drove, and hit through the line with ease twice to get his fifty in 19 balls by hammering 28 runs in the over.
Brief scores: Delhi Capitals 221/8 in 20 overs (Abishek Porel 65, Jake Fraser-McGurk 50; Ravichandran Ashwin 3-24) beat Rajasthan Royals 201/8 in 20 overs (Sanju Samson 86, Riyan Parag 27, Kuldeep yadav 2/25, Khaleel Ahmed 2/47, Mukesh Kumar 2/ 30). Agencies
Also Read: IPL 2024: Fraser-McGurk’s 84 propels Delhi Capitals to 10-run win over Mumbai Indians
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