Rajasthan Royals continued their winning streak at their home as they beat Delhi Daredevils by 3 wickets to almost cement their place in the semifinals of IPL twenty20 2008.
Chasing a target of 157 runs for victory they didn’t get up to start they were expecting from their openers and struggling at 15/2 in the 5th overs of their inning before S. Watson played a blistering knock of 74 runs of 40 balls to guide his team to victory by three wickets.
This match is always remembered for some poor umpiring and some poor fielding by Delhi Daredevils. They were dropped as many as three catches during Rajasthan Royals inning otherwise it could be different story for them. First G.Smith was dropped on naught by the leg spinner Amit Mishra who is playing his first game in IPL and then Delhi daredevils captain V.Sehwag dropped a catch of S.Watson when he was on 24 runs and in the end T.Dilshan dropped S.Warne when Rajasthan Royals needing 14 runs of 14 balls with 5 wickets in hand.
The more drama created by the on field umpires when Shane Watson run out didn’t referred to the 3rd umpire by S.Davis but replay shows he was clearly short of his crease, at that time Rajasthan needed 7 runs from 11 balls with 4 wickets in hand. However they did refer it and 3rd umpire gave S.Watson out.
But, the two new batsmen - Mahesh Rawat (5 runs) and Niraj Patel (4 runs) did not lose their nerve and won the match for their team.
Earlier Shane Warne won the toss and put Delhi Daredevils into bat. Once again V.Sehwag and G.Gambhir gave their team a solid start of 47 runs in 5.5 overs before Sehwag got out for 17 runs.
After Sehwag wicket Rajasthan Royals bounce back in the match by picking up some quick wicket and some poor running between the wickets by Delhi Daredevils. S.Dhawan has sacrifice his wicket for G.Gambhir since both batsman was at on end. However G.Gambhir didn’t capitalize too much for his partner sacrifice and eventually bold out by S.Trivedi on 33 runs.
Delhi Daredevils were struggling to reach 130 but T.Dilshan (18 runs of 15 balls) and F.Mehroof (39 runs of 16 balls) gave their team a total of 156/7 runs in their 20 overs. F.Mehroof took the charge in the 18th over bowled by S.Warne and hit four sixes in that over. He took 27 runs in that over.
S.Watson was declared Man of the Match.
Match Summary
Delhi Daredevils– 156/7 in 20 Overs
F.Mehroof– 39G.Gambhir- 31
S.Watson– 4-0-21-2S.Trivedi– 4-0-28-2
Rajasthan Royals– 159/7 in 19.1 Overs
S.Watson– 74 G.Smith – 24
A.Mishra– 3-0-27-2F.Mehroof- 4-0-22-1
Highlights IPL twenty20 – Rajasthan Royals Vs DelhiDaredevils
