Patel, Warner, Ahmed give DC easy win

The Delhi Capitals (DC) defeated the Punjab Kings (PBKS) in the thirty-second game of the 2022 Indian Premier League (IPL). The match was played in the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai. Kuldeep Yadav was adjudged to be the Man of the Match.

Agarwal has great start

Mayank Agarwal returned after missing the previous game due to injury, but the Kings' luck at the toss remained the same. When Agarwal was given the opportunity to bat first, he jumped right in. He struck three boundaries in three overs while staying alongside the line of the ball, before picking one off the leg side last ball of the third over as Shardul Thakur tried to squeeze him in. With generally more expensive powerplay overs to come, Kings were 27 for no loss after three overs.

4 overs, 4 wickets

Rishabh Pant used match-ups to his advantage by bowling Lalit Yadav to Shikhar Dhawan and getting a wicket almost immediately, but not in a planned fashion. That was a long hop down the leg side, and Dhawan attempted to assist it to fine leg but was unable to do so in time, and Pant took a wonderful catch off the bat. Trying to keep close to the line in the next over, Agarwal ended up playing on to Mustafizur Rahman.

In the final over of the powerplay, Liam Livingstone attempted to take down Axar Patel, but he wildly missed and was stumped. Jonny Bairstow hammered a flat pull off Khaleel Ahmed in the next over, but found long leg with precision. Four wickets had been lost for a total of 21 runs.

A new foursome formed

Jitesh Sharma and Shahrukh Khan formed a new partnership that stopped the wickets from falling - Sharma even managed a strike rate of about 140 - but their partnership ended at 31. Sharma attempted to sweep Patel, one of the most difficult bowlers to sweep, and was caught Leg Before Wicket (LBW). The Kings were five down with the best part of eight overs to go in the one match where they didn't play Odean Smith.

In the 14th over, Kuldeep Yadav bowled Kagiso Rabada and Nathan Ellis, Rabada with the wrong'un and Ellis with the traditional wrist spin. The last hope of a fighting total vanished as Khan edged an Ahmed off cutter through to Pant in the next over.

The final two wickets added another 23 runs, but not at a rate that would worry the Capitals.

Shaw and Warner have good time on their way home

The target would never put the Capitals' batters to the test, but they weren't going to take it easy. The importance of net run-rate is well understood by teams. Not that Prithvi Shaw needs any extra reason to start from the first ball, but David Warner, as the team's most seasoned batter, could play far more freely than he does now.

Shaw started it off, predictably, off an inside edge to a massive in swinger from Vaibhav Arora, and then more purposefully. It was practically a hit-or-miss situation between Warner and Rabada after he started pursuing him. Shaw answered with a six if Warner smashed two fours off Arora. In the fourth over, Warner drew three fours from Rabada. It took them only 3.3 overs to reach fifty, the fastest this season and the fifth-highest 3.3-over score in IPL history.

The Capitals finished with 81 runs in the powerplay, the most of any Delhi-based team in the IPL. In all IPL encounters, this was the most percentage of a 100-plus target shaved off inside the powerplay.

Their determination was not dimmed by the powerplay ending. While Shaw was dismissed for 41 off 20 balls while attempting to hit Rahul Chahar for a six in the seventh over, Warner continued to build to his IPL record of fifty-plus runs.