Delhi Capitals lost their third match of IPL 2020 as they went down against Kings XI Punjab by five wickets at Dubai International Cricket Stadium. Shreyas Iyer & Co failed to defend 164 runs as Punjab banked on a combined effort to sail past the target.
Although the chase looked simple at the halfway stage, Delhi Capitals struck early removing KL Rahul to draw the first blood. Chris Gayle played a brisk knock of 29 from 13 balls but Shreyas Iyer & Co came back to have Kings XI Punjab at 59 for three.
Delhi lose track against Punjab
But Nicholas Pooran and Glenn Maxwell shared added 69 runs for the fourth wicket to steer the run chase. But once Pooran (53 off 28 balls) and Maxwell were out, things were back to square one. But Deepak Hooda and Jimmy Neesham held their composure to make three out of three for Kings XI Punjab.
Batting first, it was all about Shikhar Dhawan for Delhi Capitals. He solely added 106 off 61 balls while the rest added 58 balls from 59 deliveries. Kings XI Punjab spinner did exceedingly well for that strangle job in the middle overs. Glenn Maxwell started off and then Ravi Bishnoi and Murugan Ashwin did an extremely good job.
We were 10 runs short – Shreyas Iyer
It all started with Rishabh Pant struggling to time the ball and Kings XI Punjab smartly used Maxwell defensive bowling. Marcus Stoinis never got going and Shimron Hetmyer didn’t get many freebies as Mohammed Shami and Arshdeep Singh hit the yorker pretty consistently. Shami was the pick of the bowlers returning with two for 28.
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Speaking at the end of the game, Shreyas Iyer admitted that they were 10-15 runs short. However, Iyer stated that there were a lot of learnings from the game. He also showered high praise on Shikhar Dhawan, who became the first batsman to score consecutive centuries in IPL.
“I feel that we fell around 10 runs short, but we got a lot of learnings from this game. Shikhar’s batting was a positive. Tushar leaked runs but that happens to the best of us. I’m sure he will come back. Shikhar read the wicket well, adapted to the situation, he went hard from Ball 1, and passed the message onto the youngsters that the wicket is stopping. He acclimatised to the conditions quicker the others,” Shreyas Iyer said.
