They wanted to win badly. And, Delhi Daredevils suffered as the formidable outfit batted, bowled and fielded brilliantly to massacre them by 93 runs, CSK’s biggest margin of victory in the Indian Premier League.
CSK’s batting line-up is the most ruthless among the teams in this tournament. Although Brendon McCullum lost his wicket early, everybody else in the top five chipped in. Suresh Raina, among the most reliable t20 batsmen in the Indian team, paced his knock really well to score 56 off 41 deliveries. Dwayne Smith (28) and Faf du Plessis (24) got starts, while Dhoni scored a superb 32 off 15 deliveries towards the end, an innings which will probably be best remembered for a booming straight drive against the bowling of speedster Jaidev Unadkat. Unadkat showed fantastic reflexes to get out of the ball’s way. Had he been fractionally slower, he might have been seriously injured.
CSK’s total of 177 for 7 was made possible largely due to the listless and wayward bowling of Mohammed Shami, who gave away 45 runs in his four overs. J P Duminy (0 for 26) who opened the bowling, Unadkat (3 for 32) and Jimmy Neesham (1 for 29) bowled well without being exceptional. Shahbaz Nadeem (1 for 29 in 3 overs) was expensive, and replacing him in the next match doesn’t appear to be beyond the realms of possibility.
DD’s response was a feeble one. The team was all out for 84, with only Jimmy Neesham (22) and skipper Dinesh Karthik managing to reach the 20s. CSK’s comprehensive win was helped by top class fielding, with not a single catch being spilled and Raina and du Plessis being particularly exceptional while holding on to the aerial balls that came their way. The inclusion of seamer Ben Hilfenhaus (1 for 9 in 2 overs) proved to be a worthy decision, and young Ishwar Pandey (2 for 23) who hit the deck and made the ball talk showed why he is being spoken of as a serious Indian prospect for sometime.
The solitary criticism of the CSK is why Dhoni isn’t coming up the batting order and giving himself more time before launching an assault on the bowlers. All said and done, however, the team won the match by a comprehensive margin. The facts of figures tell the story
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