McGurk, Porel fifties and bowlers help DC beat RR; keep playoff hopes alive

Jake FraserMcGurk and Abishek Porel slammed fifties in contrasting fashion while Kuldeep Yadav and Mukesh Kumar bowled superb spells as Delhi Capitals kept alive their hopes of making playoffs in Indian Premier League IPL 2024 with a 20run win over Rajasthan Royals at the Arun Jaitley Stadium here on Tuesday eveningFollowing fifties from FraserMcGurk and Porel Tristan Stubbs gave the finishing touches to the innings with a 20ball 41 to propel Delhi Capitals to 2218 In reply Kuldeep Yadav and Mukesh Kumar bowled decisive spells of 225 and 230 respectively to restrict RR to 2018 in 20 oversThe win sees DC jump to fifth place in the points table and they are now tied with LSG SRH and CSK at 12 points It is also the second straight time that RR despite a brilliant 86 from captain Sanju Samson have failed to complete a chase and need to wait longer to seal their Playoff spotKhaleel Ahmed struck in his first over as he had Yashasvi Jaiswal miscuing a slower bouncer to midoff Sanju Samson upped the ante with sublime timing on his loft drive flatbatted smashes punch flick and piercing the gaps in cover with precision to hit five fours and three sixes in the powerplayAlso Read FraserMcGurk of DC bonds with idol Warner to light up IPLBut RR lost Jos Buttler in the last over of the sixover phase as he chopped onto his stumps off Axar Patel meaning his catch being dropped by Tristan Stubbs didnrsquot become costly for DC With Axar and Kuldeep operating in tandem DC forced a slowdown by giving 25 runs in overs 710 though Riyan Parag got two sixes and a fourThat effort paid off as Parag was castled by a slower ball from Rasikh Salam which hit the top of offstump Samson went on to get his fifth IPL 2024 fifty in 28 balls by clearing his front leg and smacking Kuldeep over longon for six off a free hit Sitting deep in the crease Samson hit Rasikh for six over longon followed by cutting and muscling him for four and six respectivelyWith 91 runs needed off 42 balls Samson just cleared cover off Ishant for four before Shubham Dubey punched and muscled the pacer for four and six respectively to take 17 runs off the 14th over Khaleel giving away four wides in an 11run 15th over meant the equation for RR became 63 runs off 30 balls for the winSamsonrsquos fine knock came to an end in dramatic circumstances when Shai Hope took a screamer of a catch at longon just millimetres away from the boundary rope off Mukesh Though he walked up to the umpire in protest it was in vain and Samson had to depart for 86From there DC came back in the match as Shubham Dubey holed out to longon off Khaleel Kuldeep trapped Donovan Ferreira plumb lbw and had Ravichandran Ashwin holing out to longon in his final over Despite a slowover rate penalty in the final over where DC could field only four fielders outside the 30yard circle Mukesh castled Rovman Powell which was enough to get DC a crucial winEarlier FraserMcGurk enthralled everyone with a 19ball fifty while Porel found boundaries consistently to hit a 36ball 65 It was just the eighth time DC openers got the fifties in an IPL match Moreover this instance happened in New Delhi for the first time since 2015 ndash when Mayank Agarwal and Shreyas Iyer hit fifties as openersDespite a midovers slowdown Stubbs slammed three fours and as many sixes in his 41 off 20 balls to ensure the 200run mark was breached in the first innings of an IPL 2024 game here for the fourth consecutive time For RR offspinner Ravichandran Ashwin was the pick of bowlers with his 324Trent Boult began by testing FraserMcGurk from around the wicket angle and was even hit on the box once But FraserMcGurk ended the opening over by chipping a length ball over midoff for sixAfter Porel lofted and punched down the ground off Sandeep Sharma for a brace of fours FraserMcGurk brought out a lofted straight drive slash and mishit to take a six and two fours off Boult in the third overFraserMcGurkrsquos takedown of Avesh began in the fourth over when he got going after getting a four off an inside edge Staying legside of the ball he hammered sliced lofted drive and hit through the line with ease twice to get his fifty in 19 balls by hammering 28 runs in the overHis fun was ended by Ashwin as he smacked a full toss straight to cover followed by Hopes runout due to Sandeep getting a deflection on the ball going to the nonstrikerrsquos end Abishek dazzled with his legside boundaries and got his first fifty of the season with a pulled six off Avesh in the 11th overBut RR bounced back as Axar holed out to longoff against Ashwin followed by Porel slicing to backward point against the offspinner After Rishabh Pantrsquos misbalanced slogsweep was caught by deep backward square leg off Boult DC looked in danger of missing out on 200Stubbs and Gulbadin Naib had other ideas up their sleeve ndash to get a flourishing finish for DC Naib smoked Chahal twice over longon for six and four respectively Stubbs brought out reversesweep and paddle sweep for backtoback boundaries and finished the 21run over with a massive slog sweep over deep backward square for sixThough Naib was outclassed by a slower ball from Boult impact substitute Rasikh Salam got consecutive fours on backtoback scoops to take DC past 200 Stubbs smacked Sandeep for backtoback sixes in the final over before the pacer trapped the batter lbw with a pinpoint yorker followed by Kuldeep Yadavs runout on the last ball of the innings as DC went past 220Brief scoresDelhi Capitals 2218 in 20 overs Abishek Porel 65 Jake FraserMcGurk 50 Ravichandran Ashwin 324 beat Rajasthan Royals 2018 in 20 overs Sanju Samson 86 Kuldeep Yadav 225 Mukesh Kumar 230 by 20 runsThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever