IPL 2 – Day Eighteen – Kings ja ja ja sings Ojha
Two matches today – Match one was battle of royals – between Rajasthan Royals and Kings XI Punjab. Match two was somewhat less royal, between Delhi Dare Devils and how Kolkatta Knight Riders.
Those few of you who continuously come here to read my IPL posts, posted and read with a strategic time out, may ask me till how long will I continue to refer a game between two teams having some royal name as ‘battle of royals’. I have the answer. I will continue to describe a match that way till such time they continue to have more than one team containing the words “king” or “royal”.
I am happy that atleast three teams do not have any connection to royalty – Mumbai Indians, Deccan Chargers and Delhi Daredevils. Even Kolkatta has “Prince of Kolkatta” in the team and also consider everyone in their team as a “Knight”; both having connection to Royalty.
I think the names given by the owners for the teams (the five teams that are royal in one way or other, especially) should look at the Chennai league cricket teams; they have super names.
Let me get back to my blah blah about the matches played.
Match 1 – Rajasthan Royals Vs. Kings XI Punjab
Kings XI won the toss but elected to field first. A brave decision placing faith on their batting to chase down a score – probably also having sight on improving the net run rate.
Super Captain Shane Warne straight away deployed his tricks sending Naman Ojha to open the innings alongwith Graeme Smith. In the previous match, Ojha had come in at No.4 and started his IPL career with a duck. So it takes immense amount of guts and faith on the player for a captain to promote that player to No.1 spot.
As with any of Shane Warne’s calculated risks, this one also paid off. And how. Fifty runs scored off boundaries (five fours and equal number of sixes) in a stay that lasted fifty-one deliveries and earned in all sixty-eight runs for Ojha and Rajasthan Royals. A six off the second ball he faced to long on was followed up with a lofted cover drive for a four which was followed by another ball hoist to long on for a six.
At the other end, Smith was going great guns after two consecutive failures in the previous two matches (two and zero). He scored a even faster fifty than Ojha with four less sixes but seven fours more. His 77 off 44 balls indicated he might be back to prime form.
Together, Naman Ojha and Graeme Smith put on 135 for the first wicket (best opening partnership in this IPL edition and second best in all IPL matches behind Gilchrist-Laxman firm’s unbeaten 155 for the opening wicket against Mumbai Indians in 2008) before Smith departed in the fifteenth over.
With the help of Ravinder Jadeja’s super hits (33 of 12 balls, five fours and one six) and some quick sub-twenties from Yousuf Pathan and Carseldine Rajasthan Royals put up the highest team total of 211/4.
If Kings XI Punjab were to win the match, they had to score at a rate of 10 runs every over relentlessly.
If Rajasthan Royals had a record opening partnership Kings XI started badly with their new opening batsman Sohal scoring the latest golden duck of the tournament. None else other than Yuvraj Singh (48 off 37 deliveries with 3 fours and 3 sixes) and to an extent Irfan Pathan offered any resistance to the incisive bowling of Rajasthan Royals which included an unknown commodity in Amit Singh who finished with 3/9 in four overs, making Shane Warne not feel much for the absence of Kamran Khan.
Having scored the highest team total in this IPL, Rajasthan ended up winning the match by a margin of 78 runs, same difference by which Chennai Super Kings won the previous match against Deccan Chargers.
G Smith celebrated his return to form with the Man of the Match trophy but I thought it should have gone to Amit Singh for his wonderful bowling or Naman Ojha for his explosive batting.
Match 2 – Delhi Daredevils Vs. Kolkatta Knight Riders
Frankly speaking, I never expected any miracle from Kolkatta Knight Riders to make any kind of mark in this match. I was however interested in the following:
a) If Brendom McCullum sat out
b) If (a) didn’t happen, if McCullum would come good and score some runs
c) Performance of Dada
d) Margin by which Delhi Daredevils would win the match
McCullum didn’t sit out. He went for the toss and as he normally does, won it and elected to bat first.
For the first in this IPL McCullum played positively. One got to see the McCullum of 2008 IPL, albeit briefly. McCullum was at the crease for twenty nine deliveries and just went hammer and tongs over the Delhi Daredevils bowlers. He did bulk of the scoring in the opening partnership that put on 58 runs at a fair clip before he fell caught very close to the ropes when he attempted his fourth six of his innings. Overall a brave innings.
van Wyk at the other end was also stroking freely but along the ground. The 11 boundaries scored by him included two consecutive hits to the fence, twice, once off Amit Mishra and second time off Rajat Bhatia and a hat-trick of boundaries in the 13th over of the KKR innings this time off Sangwan.
van Wyk’s superb knock added 74 runs for Kolkatta Knight Riders. With the help of a quick 30 from Henriques – 24 balls, 2 fours and one six, Kolkatta challenged Delhi Daredevils to score 155 for a win. Dada was in the team but was not sent into bat though KKR had lost three wickets in the allotted twenty overs. I somehow got a feeling that Dada was being clinically sidelined.
Delhi Daredevils chased down the total with nine wickets on hand, with Gautam Gambir remaining unbeaten on 71 and Dilshan adding 42 to his tournament aggregate and pushing up his tournament average by also remaining not out. Though Gautam Gambir scored 71 runs and remained not out, I felt his was one of the most patchy knocks played by him in the recent times. He was dropped by McCullum when on 21 and was lucky not being given out when on 45. There were also few edges fetching him boundaries.
Watching Kolkatta Knight Riders defending the total was awful. They were misfielding left, right and center and dropping catches. None of the eleven players on the field appeared to be focusing on the game and the co-ordination was zilch. My heart went out for Brendon McCullum who was totally helpless in managing a dispirited bunch of players. He tried his best under the circumstances. For the first time in this IPL edition, I really felt very sad for Brendon McCullum. I think he would have fared better if he had involved Dada more in planning the strategies.
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