Sunrisers Hyderabad beat Delhi Capitals by Abhishek’s all-round game
Abhishek Sharma’s all-round play and Heinrich Klaasen’s aggressive batting in the last over helped Sunrisers Hyderabad beat Delhi Capitals by nine runs in the Indian Premier League (IPL) T20 match here on Saturday. Batting first, Sunrisers Hyderabad scored 197 for six on the basis of opener Abhishek’s 36-ball 67 and Klaasen’s 27-ball 53 not out, which is the highest score of this ground in the current season. For the team, Abdul Samad scored 28 runs in 21 balls with the help of one four and two sixes.
Mitchell Marsh’s all-round play and a 66-ball 112-run partnership for the second wicket with Phil Salt proved insufficient for the Delhi team and the team could only manage 188 runs for six wickets in 20 overs. Marsh, after taking four wickets for 27 runs in four overs, scored 63 runs in 39 balls with the help of a four and a six. Salt hit nine fours in his 35-ball 59. In the last over, Akshar Patel scored an unbeaten 29 runs in 14 balls with the help of one four and two sixes. Along with this victory, Sunrisers Hyderabad also avenged the defeat from this team on 24th April. This is the third win in eight matches for Hyderabad while it is the sixth defeat in eight matches for Delhi. Mayank Markandey took two wickets for 20 runs in four overs for Sunrisers.
Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Akil Hussain, T Natarajan and Abhishek Sharma got one success each. Defending the target, Sunrisers got off to a good start when Bhuvneshwar bowled David Warner on the second ball of the innings but Phil Salt hit three fours in the first three overs. From the other end, Marsh hit a six against Akil Hussain and then T Natarajan. After the powerplay, Delhi’s score was 57 for one wicket. Umran Malik, who came to bowl in the seventh over, was welcomed by Salt with a four, then Marsh hit two sixes and on the last ball, Salt hit another four and scored 22 runs from the over.
Marsh hit fours and sixes in consecutive balls against left-arm part-time bowler Abhishek in the ninth over. In the next over, Salt brought up his first half-century of the IPL in 29 balls with a four off Mayank Markandey and a 54-ball century partnership with Marsh. Taking a single against T Natarajan in the next over, Marsh completed his third IPL fifty in 28 balls. Markandeya took a brilliant catch of Salt off his ball in the 12th over, while in the next over, Abhishek stumped Manish Pandey (one run in three balls) by trapping him in his spin. Marsh welcomed Hussain with a six in the 13th over but in the process of playing another aerial shot, he gave a simple catch to Markram. Delhi thus lost the third wicket in three overs. In the 16th over of the innings, Priyam Garg (12 runs in nine balls) sat on the wicket in an attempt to play a big shot against Markandeya.
In the next over, Sarfaraz Khan (9 runs in 10 balls) was bowled by Natarajan. In the last over, Akshar tried to win the team but the brilliant bowling of Natarajan and Bhuvneshwar prevented him from doing so. Abhishek hit two consecutive fours in the first over of Ishant Sharma Ishant Sharma (one wicket for 31 runs) but this bowler gave Delhi the first success by dismissing Mayank Agarwal (five runs in six balls) in the third over. Rahul Tripathi (10 runs in six balls) hit a six over the wicketkeeper in the fourth over against Mukesh Kumar but returned to the pavilion in the next over by giving a catch to Manish Pandey off Mitchell Marsh.
Abhishek hit Ishant for four consecutive fours in the sixth over to take the team to 62 for two in the powerplay. In the next over, Enrich Norkia dropped a simple catch of captain Aiden Markram (8 runs in 13 balls) and on the next ball, Abhishek completed his first half-century of the season in 25 balls and the third half-century of his IPL career with a six. Marsh gave double success to Delhi in the 10th over by dismissing Markram and Harry Brooks (zero) without giving a run. Both the batsmen caught Akshar Patel at deep midwicket in an attempt to hit a six.
The 11th over was brilliant for the Sunrisers in which the team scored 24 runs. Abhishek hit fours on the first two balls of Mukesh Kumar’s over, while Heinrich Klaasen hit fours and sixes on the last two balls. Akshar Patel Akshar Patel (1/29) gave Delhi a big breakthrough in the next over though by dismissing Abhishek. Abdul Samad, who came to the crease, Kuldeep and Klaasen kept the run pace by hitting two consecutive sixes in the 16th over against Akshar. Samad became the fourth victim of this bowler after completing the half-century partnership with Klaasen by hitting a six against Marsh. Akil Hussain (16 not out in 10 balls), making his debut for the team, hit a six against Marsh in the 19th over. Klaasen reached his half-century in 25 balls after hitting two runs against Norkia in the last over.
