IPL 2017 | Clinical Delhi thrash Punjab to secure second straight win

04/15/2017

Sam Billings’ first fifty of the season, followed by a late blitz from Corey Anderson (39 off 22) took Delhi Daredevils to a competitive 188 at the Feroz Shah Kotla. In response Kings XI Punjab kept losing wickets on regular occasions as Delhi notched up a comfortable victory by 51 runs.

Brief scores: Delhi Daredevil 188/6 (Sam Billings 55, Corey Anderson 39*; Varun Aaron 2/45, K.C. Cariappa 1/23) beat Kings XI Punjab 137/9 (Axar Patel 44, David Miller 24; Shahbaz Nadeem 2/13, Chris Morris 3/23) by 51 runs.

Glenn Maxwell said that losing the toss did not make much of a difference to him, as he would have bowled first anyway, while also mentioning that Marcus Stoinis had been replaced by Eoin Morgan and Ishant Sharma made way for KC Cariappa. Zaheer Khan, on the other hand, said his side looked to make the most of a batting wicket after replacing Aditya Tare with Shreyas Iyer in the playing 11.

Sam Billings takes centre stage

Sanju Samson started in typical fashion dispatching Sandeep Sharma for two boundaries in the very first over before Sam Billings also joined the party with back to back boundaries off Mohit Sharma in the next over. The introduction of Axar Patel in the fourth over stemmed the initial run flow but Billings made up for lost time tearing into Varun Aaron by scoring 14 off the pacer’s first over. A six from Sanju Samson meant that Delhi managed to reach 49/0 at the end of the powerplay. It was K.C. Cariappa who got Punjab the wicket they were looking for as Samson’s big hit found Eoin Morgan at long-on. Karun Nair’s disappointing season continued as the youngster, yet again, failed to make a notable contribution to the team. Even though the quick wickets had trimmed the initial blitz of runs, Delhi found themselves at a comfortable 83/2 at the halfway stage with Sam Billings still at the crease.

Delhi finish with a flourish

Just as it looked like Dehi were on their way to posting yet another 200+ score, Shreyas Iyer (22) and Billings (55) were dismissed in consecutive overs as Punjab found a foothold in the game. But the incoming Corey Anderson and Rishabh Pant wasted no time at all as the latter smashed Cariappa for back to back boundaries to take Delhi to 120 with five overs to go. However, keeping with the trend of the game, Pant had to make his way back after mistiming a Varun Aaron bouncer. Delhi’s hero of the last game, Chris Morris, started off well but yet again failed to see the innings out, he scored 16 of 8 balls. Anderson, who had, till then, been playing an uncharacteristically slow game, scoring 14 off 15 balls, jumped to life. The Kiwi along with Pat Cummins scored 35 runs off the last two overs to take Delhi to 188 in their allotted overs.

Punjab’s top order struggles continue

Like they had done against Pune, Delhi stopped Punjab from building any sort of momentum from the get go. Zaheer Khan gave away just two runs in the first over, which led to Manan Vohra succumbing to pressure in the next one getting caught plumb off a Nadeem delivery. The 27-year-old, who had just two wickets before the game, doubled his tally in his next over dismissing Saha. Before Punjab managed to reach the 40 run mark in their powerplay overs, they had already lost Hashim Amla as well, with Delhi taking charge of the match. Maxwell decided to send in Eoin Morgan and David Miller before himself but the duo was struggling to keep up with the required run rate that had already crept close to 11. After struggling to pick up Mishra, Morgan decided to attack Pat Cummins in the 10th over. Although the Englishman was able to breach the infield to score two boundaries, he too was dismissed on the last ball off the over as Punjab limped to 64 runs for the loss of 4 wickets at the midway point.

Too little too late

With their backs against the wall, Glenn Maxwell had little choice but to come out swinging. However, his luck deserted him as he accurately located Billings off the bowling of Amit Mishra to make his way back for a duck. It seemed like only a matter of time before Punjab feel to their second defeat on the trot and Miller’s LBW dismissal virtually signaled the end of the game. Axar Patel and Mohit Sharma stitched together something of a partnership (45) in the end but it was only delaying the inevitable as Punjab eventually fell short by 51 runs.

Punjab will take on Hyderabad in their next fixture on Monday and given that both the sides have lost their last two games after winning the first two, it should be quite a spectacle.

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