Rampant Delhi produced a clinical performance on Wednesday night at the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai to crush Punjab by a huge margin of 9 wickets in the Match No 32 of the ongoing Indian T20 Cricket League 2022 tournament.
Delhi bowlers’ unified show and opening batsman David Warner along with Prithvi Shaw helped execute a perfect all-round display to help their team move up in the points table of the Indian T20 Cricket League 2022 competition.
Delhi are now placed at sixth position with six points in as many matches having won three and lost the rest. They also have a healthy net run rate of 0.942, which it's better than the team placed above them in the points table, Hyderabad, whose net run rate is -0.077.
After restricting Punjab for 115, Delhi batsmen came out all guns blazing as they knocked over the target to score 119/1 in 10.3 overs to help their side record a huge victory.
On what has been a perfect batting pitch at the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai, Delhi bowlers produced a clinical performance to dismiss Punjab for a paltry total of 115 in their 20 overs, with only four of their batsmen getting into double digits.
Punjab wicket-keeper batsman Jitesh Sharma scored 32 from 23 balls with the help of 5 boundaries whereas captain Mayank Agarwal, who was the back in to the side after missing their previous match, scored 24 from 15 balls with the help of 4 boundaries.
Shahrukh Khan and Rahul Chahar scored identical numbers of 12 as the rest of the Punjab batsmen cut a sorry figure against the Delhi bowlers, who were all over them after their captain Rishabh Pant won the toss and invited Mayank Agarwal and Co to bat first.
Punjab made a strong start reaching 33 from 3.3 overs but their openers Shikhar Dhawan and Mayank Agarwal getting off to a flying start. However, they were rocked by Delhi all-rounder Lalit Agrawal who dismissed Shikhar Dhawan for 9 on the fourth ball of the fourth over, and Punjab slipped when Mustafizur Rahman cleaned up Mayank Agarwal for 24 in the next over.
Punjab lost wickets in heaps as their star all-rounder Liam Livingstone was caught behind by Rishabh Pant off Axar Patel for 2, and their English wicketkeeper-batsman Jonny Bairstow could manage only 9 before Khaleel Ahmed had him caught by Mustafizur Rahman.
Struggling at 54/4 in the 7th over, Punjab required their batsmen to step up with a strong partnership and a pair of Jitesh Sharma and Shahrukh Khan did exactly that, adding 31 runs to pick their side close to the 100-run mark.
Axar Patel broke the partnership in the 13th over when he trapped Jitesh Sharma leg before for 32, following which Punjab once again went into a downward spiral losing wickets in a heap and eventually finished at a total of 115.
For Delhi, Axar Patel was the pick among the bowlers as the left-arm spinner returned with figures of 4-0-10-2, Kuldeep Yadav recorded 4-0-24-2, Lalit Yadav took 2/11 from his 2 overs and left-arm India discard bowler Khaleel Ahmed took 2/21 from his 4 overs.
Delhi batsmen David Warner and Prithvi Shaw showed no mercy as they aimed for aggressive approach with the bat to finish the match as soon as possible and get as many points for their net run rate. Prithvi Shaw was off the blocks quickly once again, smacking 41 from 20 balls with 7 boundaries and a six before he was dismissed by Punjab legspinner Rahul Chahar in the seventh over of the innings.
But by then, the pair of Prithvi Shaw and David Warner had already added 83 runs for the opening wicket to shut the doors entirely on Punjab, taking their side on the brink of what turned out to be a massive victory in terms of margin.
David Warner was belligerent with the bat once again, hammering 10 boundaries and a six to make 60 not out from 30 balls, as he finished the game in the company of right-handed middle-order batsman Sarfaraz Khan, who was on 12 not out when the winning runs were scored.
Delhi would want to continue with their momentum when they take on Rajasthan at the Wankhede Stadium on Friday night whereas Punjab will be desperate to bounce back when they face a struggling Chennai on Monday, April 25 at the same venue.
Devarchit Varma is a cricket writer and journalist with an experience of more than a decade, having worked at Hindustan Times (newspaper) and CricketCountry (website). Along with covering international and domestic cricket, he has also interviewed several current and former top players such as Rohit Sharma, Steve Smith, Dale Steyn, Michael Hussey, Jacques Kallis, Brendon McCullum, Shane Watson, Lasith Malinga and many more. He has also worked in other beats as a journalist in Bollywood (Reliance BigOye) and IT (SiliconIndia) industries.
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