The home crowd at the Sawai Man Singh stadium had every opportunity to cheer for the native team. Kolkata Knight Riders chasing a total of 197 had a shaky start. With 3 wickets falling in first six overs, Royals showed their best in trying to break Kolkata's batting order. Royals' tasted thier fourth consecutive win, the first one where they batted firstand won the game by a subsatantial margin of 45 runs.
It was Sohail Tanvir who gave the Royals their first breakthrough when he bowled out fellow countryman Salman Butt by blowing his off-stumps.
The exit of stalwarts like Brendon Mc Cullum and Ricky Ponting had led to some changes in the batting order. Ajit Agarkar came at 3rd down, to add to the total's chase. After hitting 2 sixes and a single boundary, he was caught by keeper Rawat on Shane Watson's delivery. He made 20 runs. The next man in Hodge was simply unlucky as he was run-out when bowler Trivedi's hand touched the ball and hit the stumps while he was standing out of crease.
The last ball of twelfth over bought some controversy with it. Ganguly was caught by Smith off Pathan's ball, but he didn't leave the crease and pressurised the on feild umpire to refer the decision to the third umpire. Finally, the decision went in favor of the batsman. But, that was not of much help to Dada, as shortly, afetr completing his half century off 38 balls, was caught at long-on by Mohd. Kaif on Royals' captain Shane Warne's delivery. He contributed a total of 51 runs off 39 balls.
And after Saurav's departure, the downslide started for the Kolkata team. They started throwing their wickets to Royals' bowlers superb bowling.
One by one the wickets came tumbling down with the last wicket of Ashok Dinda being caught by Asnodkar on Watson's delivery. The rush to make the victory thiers as soon as possible was evident in the way, Warne and Asnodhkar raced and clashed to take the final catch. And,the Kinght Riders lost their third consecutive game by a big margin of 45 runs.
The Rajasthan Royals’ batsmen assaulted every bowler of Kolkata Knight Riders to the fullest and put a huge total of 197 for them to chase.
In the sweltering afternoon in Jaipur’s Sawai Man Singh stadium, Shane Warne, captain and coach of Rajasthan Royals won the toss and decided to bat. To his disappointment, in his very first over, Ishant Sharma showed his mettle. With a great pace (145kmph), he clean bowled Graeme Smith, in the last ball of the second over. Smith faced 7 balls and could make only 2 runs. This was an early blow to the Royals who started slow . The score was 11-1 after two overs.
However, Mohammad Kaif (21), who came after the fall of Smith, tried his best to push the score further and hit some splendid shots; one of them was a huge six, he hit off Agarkar in the seventh over. Unfortunately, he was caught and bowled by Ajit Agarkar on the last ball of the same over. Together with opener Asnodkar he added 40 runs to the scoreboard.
Umar Gul double struck in the 12th over to put a break on Rajasthan’s run riot. He sent S Asnodkar (caught Hussey) and S Watson (LBW) back to pavilion giving the much awaited respite to Sourav Ganguly. While Asnodkar hit 60, Watson could not even open his account. The score at this point was 111/4.
The 24-year old right hand batsman from Goa, Swapnil Asnodkar (60), was the pick of the player today for the Rajasthan Royals. The batsman scored a superb half century in his first IPL match. He did not respect Ishant’s pace or Agarkar’s Yorkers (he hit Agarkar for three consecutive boundaries in the ninth over). He completed his 50 in 29 balls in the 10th over of the inning. The half century included eight fours and one six. Hussey took an easy catch off Gul’s bowling to end Asnodkar’s inning. He also had a 50-run partnership with Yusuf Pathan,
After Asnodkar’s departure, Pathan and Jadeja took the reins of the team. Jadeja added crucial 33 runs in 19 balls (three fours and one six), while Pathan completed his fifty in style hitting a six off Shukla’s bowling. He made 55 that included six fours and two sixes. Gul clean bowled him in the 20th over when the team’s score was 190 for 6.
Shane Warne made 7 and was cleverly run out by Umar Gul in the 20th over. Sohail Tanvir (2) and M Rawat (1) remained unbeaten.
Earlier Kolkata brought in Salman Butt, BJ Hodge, and Umar Gul while Rajasthan made two changes- they included SA Asnodkar and Sohail Tanvir as new faces
Friday, May 2, 2008
Rajasthan Royals go riding on their 4th Win in IPL
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