Sunrisers Hyderabad continued to set lofty standards of ultra-attacking batting in IPL 2024 as Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma brought an out-of-the-world hurricane of dazzling stroke-play to set the base for a 67-run win over Delhi Capitals at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Saturday.
On a placid pitch, Head (82 off 39 balls) and Abhishek (46 off 12 balls) left everyone breathless and speechless by smashing 24 boundaries in their 131-run opening stand off just 38 balls as SRH smashed a gigantic 266/7, the fourth-highest total in IPL and breaching 250+ mark for the third time.
In reply, Natarajan fired his yorkers well to pick a brilliant 4-19 as DC were bowled out for 199. Their lone bright spot was young Jake Fraser-McGurk hitting fastest fifty of the season in 15 balls.
Impact player Prithvi Shaw began DC’s chase by smashing Washington Sundar for four boundaries on first four balls. But Sundar had the last laugh as Shaw miscued a loft to cover. David Warner didn’t do much as a leading edge off Bhuvneshwar Kumar was caught by a diving Pat Cummins at mid-off.
Fraser-McGurk brought out his clean bat swing by whacking Sundar for three sixes and as many fours in the third over to collect 30 runs. With Abishek Porel hitting three boundaries from the other end, Fraser-McGurk backed away to drill Pat Cummins for four and then got down on one knee to hit a lofted drive over mid-on for six as 20 runs came off the fifth over.
After amassing 88/2 in power-play, Fraser-McGurk smashed a 15-ball fifty, also the fastest half-century by a DC batter in IPL, by launching a six over long-on off Mayank Markande. He would smoke two more sixes over long-off before miscuing a slog to point and fall for 18-ball 65, with the crowd giving him a standing ovation.
Porel launched a stunning assault against Shahbaz Ahmed, picking the lengths well to hit three fours and a six as 22 runs came off the eighth over. But Porel missed a wide delivery from Markande and was stumped for 22-ball 42.
Rishabh Pant got a rousing reception from his home crowd and he didn’t disappoint them by producing two dazzling flicks fetching him boundaries off Bhuvneshwar. But he struggled to find fluency big time, especially being beaten on pace by Cummins, which meant DC crumbled under pressure.
Tristan Stubbs succumbed to it by pulling to mid-wicket off Nitish Reddy, followed by Lalit Yadav’s leg-stump being sent on a cartwheel ride by T Natarajan, who took out Axar Patel, Anrich Nortje and Kuldeep Yadav in the 19th over. Though Pant collected boundaries, it was too late for DC to prevent themselves from slumping to their fifth defeat of the competition.
Brief Scores: Sunrisers Hyderabad 266/7 in 20 overs (Travis Head 89, Shahbaz Ahmed 59 not out; Kuldeep Yadav 4-55, Axar Patel 1-29) beat Delhi Capitals 199 in 19.1 overs (Jake Fraser-McGurk 65, Rishabh Pant 44; T Natarajan 4-19, Nitish Reddy 2-19) by 67 runs
