IPL 2021 Matches 28 & 29: SRH v/s RR & PBKS v/s DC. Rajasthan & Delhi move to 5th and 1st spots in the points table.

Hello everyone and thank you for coming to read another article for the match updates of IPL 2021. There were two matches on Sunday as Rajasthan and Hyderabad were up against each other in the afternoon match and Delhi and Punjab fought it out in the evening match. Rajasthan won the first match after posting a huge target for Hyderabad and then defending it comfortably. And Delhi chased down the target set by Punjab with ease after they restricted Punjab to a par score in the first inning. The first match was played at Feroz Shah Kotla ground and the second one was played at Narendra Modi ground.

After winning the toss, Hyderabad asked Rajasthan to bat first in the first game of the day. Hyderabad was playing with a new captain, Kane Williamson as David Warner was dropped from the playing 11 because of his form and slow batting in the initial matches. Jos Buttler and Yashasvi Jaiswal opened for Rajasthan but Jaiswal was dismissed by Rashid Khan during the power play overs on 12 runs. Sanju Samson came in to bat next after him and he and Buttler together played an outstanding game of cricket. They initially looked to build a partnership to recover from the early first wicket fall but once they had gotten a good start, they both started playing their shots. Samson scored 48 runs in 33 balls before he was dismissed by Vijay Shankar. He hit 4 fours and 2 sixes in his inning. Buttler on the other end went on to score his first T20 ton as he attacked all the Rajasthan ballers for his 124 runs inning. He was dismissed after playing 64 balls and he hit 11 fours and 8 sixes in that. He got out in the 19th over but he had done his job for the team. Rajasthan finished their inning on 220 runs and Hyderabad had a massive target in front of them. Rashid Khan was the only bowler who was economical for Hyderabad as all the other bowlers went for runs. 

Manish Pandey and Johnny Bairstow opened for Hyderabad in the run chase and the Rajasthan bowlers kept it tight from the first over. Kartik Tyagi and Mustafizur Rahman started well for Rajasthan as Hyderabad could not score runs freely as they would have wanted. Manish Pandey was dismissed by Mustafizur in the 7th over by a brilliant yorker and he went back after scoring 31 runs in 20 balls. Bairstow got out next a couple of overs later after scoring 30 runs in 21 balls. And Hyderabad kept losing regular wickets after that. None of the remaining batsmen could score more than 20 runs and Hyderabad never looked to be in the chase. The bowlers of Rajasthan were outstanding as Mustafizur Rahman and Chris Morris picked up 3 wickets each and Kartik Tyagi and Rahul Tyagi picked up 1 wicket each. Hyderabad could get to 165 only in the run chase and Rajasthan won the match comfortably by  55 runs.

It was a convincing win for Rajasthan as it helped them with the net run rate as well to take them to the 5th spot in the points table. Hyderabad has lost their 6th match now and the equation gets tough for them from here on. They now need to win all the remaining matches to qualify which doesn't look easy as per the team's current form. 

The toss in the second game was won by Rishabh Pant and he asked Punjab to bat first. Punjab was playing without KL Rahul in this match as he has been diagnosed with appendicitis and will undergo surgery for it. It's doubtful now whether he would be able to continue playing in the remainder of the tournament or not. I'll keep you all updated with the news on his status. Mayank Agarwal was the captain of Punjab in this match and David Malan got to debut in the IPL. Prabhsimran Singh and Mayank opened the inning for Punjab but Prabhsimran was dismissed early by Kagiso Rabada on 12 runs. He played 16 balls to score those runs and Punjab had a bad start. It got even worse when Chris Gayle was bowled by Rabada on 13 runs and Punjab lost its 2 batsmen in the power play overs. Malan came in to bat next to join his captain and the two struggled to score freely. The bowlers of Delhi kept things tight and runs got hard to come. Malan was dismissed by Axar Patel later and he went back after scoring 26 runs in the same number of balls. Deepak Hooda was run out in the same over and things looked difficult for Punjab from there. But Mayank started playing his shots after that and he took his team's total to a respectable score. He remained unbeaten on 99 runs which he scored in 58 balls and Punjab finished on 166 runs. Mayank hit 8 fours and 4 sixes in his inning and he played an outstanding knock after struggling to score freely in the first half of his inning as he had scored only 29 runs after playing 25 balls. Rabada picked 3 wickets for Delhi and Avesh Khan and Axar Patel picked up 1 each.

Prithvi Shaw and Shikhar Dhawan got their team a strong start once again as they put up a 50+ run partnership for the opening wicket. Both played their shots and made the most of the power play over. Prithvi was bowled by Harpreet Brar soon after that though and he went back after scoring 39 runs in 22 balls. Steve Smith was the new batsman in and he looked comfortable in this match. He built a partnership with Dhawan as Dhawan was the aggressor in that partnership and Smith focused on rotating the strike. Smith was dismissed by Riley Meredith on 24 runs and Punjab got their second wicket. Rishabh Pant was the next batsman and he too got out after scoring 14 runs in 11 balls but the equation had become simple for Delhi by then. Shimron Hetmyer and Shikhar Dhawan remained unbeaten for Delhi as they scored 16 runs and 69 runs respectively to win the match by 7 wickets for their team. They had 14 balls left to spare and Delhi climbed to the number 1 spot with this win.

Delhi would be pleased with this win as they had an all round performance by their players. Punjab would be disappointed to fall short by 20-25 runs. The scoring rate was very low in the middle overs and that cost them deeply. Mayank tried to compensate for that in the end but that didn't prove to be enough as Delhi won comfortably at the end.

The next match in the tournament is between Kolkata Knight Riders and Royal Challengers Bangalore. Both the teams lost their last match but Bangalore is in a better position than Kolkata in the points table. Kolkata has won only 2 matches in their 7 games and they would look to improve this number from here on. Let's wait to find out what happens in this match. Please read the summary of it here on Tuesday morning. Until then, stay home and stay safe!