Mumbai: Sam Curran hammered 34 off 15 balls at the back-end of Chennai Super Kings (CSK) innings, including thrashing his older brother Tom for 16 runs in three balls in the 19th over, to help the men in yellow reach 188/7 in their 20 overs against Delhi Capitals (DC) here at the Wankhede Stadium on Saturday.
The two sides are playing their first match of the IPL 2021 season.
The CSK innings was a roller-coaster as they began by losing two early wickets against a DC pace attack that missed the services of acclaimed internationals Kagiso Rabada, Anrich Nortje (under quarantine), Umesh Yadav and Ishant Sharma (injury).
Faf du Plessis was out leg-before to pace bowler Avesh Khan while Ruturaj Gaikwad was caught in slips off the bowling of Chris Woakes.
Moeen Ali (36 off 24 balls) and Suresh Raina (54 off 36 balls) then resurrected the innings with a 53-run partnership for the third wicket with the former going after R Ashwin, hitting him for two successive sixes. However, Ashwin got the England left-hander out on the third ball as he went for a reverse sweep and was caught in the deep.
Raina then added 63 for the fourth wicket with Ambati Rayudu (23 off 16 balls) but a few quick wickets set CSK back. Rayudu was caught at long-off off the bowling of Tom Curran. Soon, the 16th over, bowled by Avesh, saw two important wickets.
Raina was run out following a mix-up with Ravindra Jadeja (26 not out off 17 balls) while skipper MS Dhoni was bowled by Avesh as he tried to pull him to fence but instead inside-edged the ball to stumps.
At 143/6 after 16 overs, getting close to 190 seemed distant if not impossible. However, Curran and Jadeja took 23 runs from Tom Curran’s fourth over, the innings’ 19th, to help CSK get to a big total.
Brief scores: Chennai Super Kings 188/7 in 20 overs (S Raina 54, M Ali 36, S Curran 34, R Jadeja 26 not out, C Woakes 2/18, A Khan 2/23) vs Delhi Capitals