In IPL 2021 Phase-2, a match was played between Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) and Rajasthan Royals (RR) on Monday, which Hyderabad won by 7 wickets by showing a great game. SRH had a target of 165 runs in the match, which the team achieved with 9 balls to spare.
This was Hyderabad's first win after consecutive defeats in the last four matches. With the win, SRH has four points. However, the team is still ranked 8th. At the same time, with the defeat, the difficulties have increased a lot for RR. The team will now have to win their remaining four matches and also have to improve the run rate. There is no doubt that every single match for Samson & Co is going to be nothing short of do or die.
Chasing the target, SRH got off to a quick start. Jason Roy and Wriddhiman Saha added 57 runs in 31 balls for the first wicket. Saha returned to the pavilion after being stumped off the ball of Mahipal Lomror after scoring 18 runs.
Jason Roy, playing his first match for SRH, scored 60 runs in 42 balls while batting brilliantly. Roy hit 8 fours and a six in his innings. This was his second and half-century in the IPL. In the IPL auction, Hyderabad bought Jason Roy for Rs 2 crore. With this innings, the explosive batsman has cemented his place in the playing XI.
Within six balls after Roy's wicket, RR showed the way to Priyam Garg for zero. Garg's wicket came in Mustafizur Rahman's account. However, these two wickets did not have any significant effect on Hyderabad. Captain Kane Williamson batted brilliantly for the team and played an unbeaten inning of 51 runs off 41 balls and returned from the field to give victory to the team. Apart from Captain Kane, Abhishek Sharma also scored an unbeaten 21 off 16 balls.
Sanju Samson scored his second consecutive fifty while batting brilliantly. The RR captain played a fine inning of 82 runs off 57 balls. With this innings, Samson became the second player after Ajinkya Rahane (3098) to score 2500+ runs for Rajasthan Royals. Along with this, he also completed his 3 thousand runs in IPL. Sanju became the 19th player to score 3 thousand runs in IPL. Samson has scored 433 runs this season and with this, the Orange Cap has also come to him.
Mahipal Lomror and Sanju Samson put on 84 runs for the fourth wicket. Siddharth Kaul did the work of breaking this partnership. Kaul made a strong comeback for Hyderabad by dismissing Samson (84) on the second ball of the last over and Riyan Parag (0) on the fourth ball. Along with Parag's wicket, Siddharth Kaul also completed his 50 wickets for SRH. Kaul spent just four runs in the 20th over.
The first wicket for RR fell as Evin Lewis (6). His wicket came in the account of Bhuvneshwar Kumar. Bhuvi gave a big success to Hyderabad by getting Lewis caught by Abdul Samad on the very first ball of the second over.
The wickets of Lewis Yashasvi Jaiswal and Sanju Samson added 56 runs for the second wicket. Jaiswal looked in fine form, but Sandeep Sharma picked up his wicket to give SRH a second breakthrough. Jaiswal was dismissed after scoring 36 runs in 23 balls. The young opener also hit 5 fours and a six in his innings. After the wicket of Yashasvi, Liam Livingstone (4) also could not do anything amazing and his wicket came in the account of Rashid Khan.
The Royals made three changes. Evin Lewis, Jaydev Unadkat, and Chris Morris returned to the squad, while SRH made four changes to include Priyam Garg, Abhishek Sharma, Siddharth Kaul, and Jason Roy.
David Warner was not included in the playing XI in SRH's team yesterday. In the first two matches of Phase II, Warner's bat was completely silent. Against Delhi, he was dismissed without opening an account, while against Punjab Kings he could score only 2 runs. He's out of form was also a major reason for SRH being out of the playoffs.