Dubai: Delhi Capitals (DC) scored 164 runs against Kings XI Punjab (KXIP) in the first innings of the 38th match of the 2020 Indian Premier League (IPL) at the Dubai International Stadium on Tuesday. However, KXIP's batsmen chased the target score successfully and won the match by 5 wickets. Pooran's half century proved costlier than Shikhar Dhawan's ton.
KXIP skipper KL Rahul and Mayank Agarwal were the opening batsmen of the team.
Hitting a six in the 3rd ball of the first over, Rahul recorded a century of sixes in IPL. It was a good start indeed for KXIP team. However, Axar Patel dismissed Rahul in the 3rd over. Patel got the big wicket while Rahul scored 15 runs of 11 balls.
However, the spirits of Punjab team was not yet down as Chris Gayle was yet to bat. Gayle hit boundaries taking the team's total score to 52. But, Ravichandran Ashwin's 6th over turned out spoiler for their hopes. Ashwin dismissed Gayle while he scored 29 runs off 13 balls.
Next, it was Mayank who turned back to the pavilion scoring only 5 runs in 9 balls. Ashwin made him run out.
At the end of the powerplay, KXIP's total score stood at 57/3 at a loss of 3 wickets.
However, Nicholas Pooran striking performance took the team to score a 100 runs in total within 10 overs.
Pooran scored his fifty very fast. He scored 53 runs off 27 balls, while Glenn Maxwell's score stood at 16 runs off 15 balls. However, Kagiso Rabada dismissed Pooran in the next ball of scoring his fifty.
Deepak Hooda took over the charge with Maxwell to led their team towards victory. It was MAxwell who took the team's total score to 149 runs. However, Rabada struck again dismissing Maxwell at 32 runs. Maxwell departed in the 16th over.
Rabada took the two major wickets and brought a twist in the game as chances of KXIP leading towards victory was looming.
Even though, after the major twist in the game, Deepak and Neesham took the team towards achieving the target score and clinched the victory from DC. KXIP won by 5 wickets and scored 167 runs with one over to spare.
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Shikhar Dhawan's unbeaten 106 runs helped DC score 164 runs at a loss of 5 wickets. Dhawan almost single-handedly took DC to 164/5 wickets in their 20 overs. Dhawan is the first player in IPL history to score back-to-back centuries.
The left-hander, however, hardly got any support from the rest of his team mates, who combined to score 54 runs off 59 balls. DC captain Shreyas Iyer and Rishabh Pant, who returned after an injury, are the joint second highest scorers behind Dhawan with 14 runs each.
Pacer Mohammed Shami was the star of what was an economical bowling effort from KXIP. He took two wickets and conceded 28 runs in his four overs. James Neesham, brought in for Chris Jordan, provided the breakthrough with the wicket of the out of form Prithvi Shaw. Murugan Ashwin dismissed Shreyas while Pant fell to Glenn Maxwell.
Earlier, DC won the toss and chose to bat against KXIP.
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