The last season’s finalists, Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) locked horns with each other in the 41st match of the ongoing season of the Indian Premier League (IPL) at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai. After winning the toss, the CSK skipper, MS Dhoni asked the visitors to bat first. Despite a decent start from SRH, CSK managed to maintain their unbeaten home run in this season.
Harbhajan Singh’s inclusion paid rich dividends for CSK as he picked the first two wickets for them. Firstly, he dismissed Bairstow in the 2nd over followed by the wicket of David Warner in the 14th over. After the early dismissal of Bairstow, Manish Pandey and Warner started slogging the CSK bowlers all over the park. They amassed as many as 54 runs in the powerplay and surprisingly, Manish was scoring at the higher strike-rate.
Slow end
Pandey and Warner added 111 runs for the second wicket before the latter getting out in the 14th over as he was looking tired as well due to the intense humidity of Chennai. However, despite some later fireworks of Pandey (49-ball 83) and Vijay Shankar, SRH only managed to reach the total of 175/3 in their quota of 20 overs as Shankar played a bit slow as per the expectations.
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During the chase, Shane Watson and Faf du Plessis started cautiously as they scored the first run on the 11th ball of the innings. However, in the next over, the latter got run-out owing to a brilliant throw from Deepak Hooda. After his dismissal, Suresh Raina came out to bat and he started smashing the SRH bowlers. His real carnage came in the final over of powerplay when he smashed Sandeep Sharma for 22 runs with help of 4 fours and a six.
Watson’s knock
Raina was dismissed by Rashid Khan’s brilliant googly in the 10th over. After his dismissal, Watson kept on smashing the SRH bowlers as he amassed as many as 96 runs from 53 balls before getting out in the 18th over of Bhuvneshwar Kumar owing to a brilliant catch from Bairstow.
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After Watson’s dismissal, CSK needed 9 runs in the final over and Ambati Rayudu and Kedar Jadhav were batting at the crease and the latter smashed the six on the second ball and the hosts went past the line with a ball to spare and 6 wickets in hand despite Rayudu getting out in the final over.
Brief Score:
Chennai Super Kings – 176/4 in 19.5 overs (S Watson: 96, S Raina: 38; B Kumar: 1/18) defeated Sunrisers Hyderabad – 175/3 in 20 overs (M Pandey: 83*, D Warner: 57; H Singh: 2/39) by 6 wickets and a ball to spare
