Marsh, Sakariya keep DC alive with impressive win

The Delhi Capitals (DC) defeated the Rajasthan Royals (RR) in the fifty-eighth game of the 2022 Indian Premier League (IPL). The match was played in the DY Patil Stadium in Navi Mumbai. Mitchell Marsh was adjudged to be the Man of the Match.

Buttler's unusual defeat

Jos Buttler has carried the batting for the Royals, a team with a small batting line-up and only one toss victory in 12 games, but he was stymied and eventually dismissed for his lowest score and earliest dismissal of the season. Coming in for the injured Khaleel Ahmed, Chetan Sakariya didn't offer him much to work with, and when he did get a full ball - the fifth of the third over - all he accomplished was a straight shot to mid-on. 7 off of 11.

Anchor that pinches

Because there was something in the pitch, the Royals elevated Ravichandran Ashwin to No. 3 to take advantage of the powerplay overs without sacrificing a more important - and scarce - batting resource, especially with Shimron Hetmyer out. Even though Ashwin got stranded twice, he managed to get out of both situations. In the sixth over, he reacted to a run-a-ball start by hitting Axar Patel for a six and a four. Later in the innings, he went after Kuldeep Yadav and Sakaria to go to fifty.

He wouldn't have preferred to bat for this long because he had started going for everything in the eighth over, but Yashasvi Jaiswal fell to Mitchell Marsh in the ninth over, delaying Ashwin's hit-out-or-get-out assault because two new hitters at the wicket is not ideal. When Ashwin was out for 50 off 38, he left Sanju Samson and Riyan Parag with 35 balls to destroy.

Capitals continue to strike

However, Anrich Nortje and Sakariya bowled two brilliant overs towards the end to dismiss Samson and Parag. Samson got too much under Nortje's hard length, while Parag dropped to Sakariya's slower back-of-the-hand ball. Devdutt Padikkal, batting in the unorthodox No. 4 position, kept the Royals in the game with his 48 off 30, but when Nortje got him out at the start of the 19th, all of the Royals' batting strategies failed. The last two overs were faced by Rassie van der Dussen and Trent Boult, who only managed 14 runs.

Royals' hot start

The Royals needed a strong start to keep the defense entertained, and they almost had it. Boult dismissed Srikar Bharat with his second ball, Prasidh Krishna followed with his third maiden of the IPL, and Boult had a tight leg before wicket (lbw) appeal against Marsh dismissed. Marsh appeared to have hit it, but replays revealed that he had not.

Marsh's performance

Marsh got his reprieve there. Marsh backed himself up and didn't make much of a four-off-12 start - some of the most difficult bowling he's faced in Twenty20 cricket, according to Marsh - before launching into his maiden six, over extra cover off an Ashwin carrom ball. In the eighth over, he targeted Kuldeep Sen with two consecutive sixes. David Warner was still 12 off the pace, while Marsh had jumped to 39 off 28.

Warner also had some luck when he cut one to long-on off Yuzvendra Chahal, but Buttler couldn't quite get there, and the bail refused to fall when Chahal hit his leg stump. 

With five overs to go, the asking rate was permitted to reach 9.4, but Marsh ended Ashwin's night with a six and a four, giving him numbers of 4-0-32-0, just what they needed in the final four overs. Marsh was 11 runs short of a century, but Rishabh Pant put the game out of reach with two sixes in four balls. Warner finished with 52 runs in 41 balls.