Nitish Rana’s Rampage vs Ravichandran Ashwin
Ravichandran Ashwin is known for troubling left-handers. Ashwin holds the record of dismissing the most no. of left-handers in test cricket by picking 268 wickets of lefties. But, Nitish Rana is one of the very few or probably the only left left-handers in IPL to dominate Ashwin. Ashwin did that in yesterday’s match too.
Ruturaj introduced Ashwin in the 5th over of the powerplay and Rana take on over Ashwin immediately. he started reverse Ashwin towards point region and scored boundaries. Ashwin went for 19 runs in his first over. Nitish Rana took the momentum from that over and played aggressively throughout his innings.
When Ashwin came back to bowl in the middle overs, he again smashed him for slog sweeps and inside-out shots over the covers. Rana spoiled Ashwin’s spell today & reminded Glenn Maxwell’s onslaught against Ashwin in 2014. Nitish Rana smashed 33 runs of 13 balls against Ashwin today and got out to him for the first time in IPL.
Overall in IPL history, Nitish Rana scored 141 runs off 71 balls from Ashwin and has been dismissed only once, which came yesterday. He scored 81 runs off 36 balls in yesterday’s match which played a crucial part in RR’s victory.
Sandeep Sharma’s masterclass in the 20th over again
MS Dhoni and Ravindra Jadeja are in the middle. 20 runs required of 6 balls. Deshpande went for 19 runs in the last over. Parag gave the ball to Sandeep Sharma instead of Jofra Archer, who had a dream spell of 3 overs, 13 runs and took the important wicket of Rachin for the duck. Sandeep was wicketless in went for 29 runs in his previous 3 overs.
Riyan Parag though backed Sandeep to bowl the last over as he already had the experience of defending runs against Dhoni in the last over which he did two years ago in 2023. Sandeep Sharma started the over with a wide but picked the important wicket of Dhoni in the very next ball which almost sealed the game for RR.
Jamie Overton hit one six in the 3rd ball of the over, but that was only enough to reduce the loss ratio. RR won the game by 6 runs. Sandeep Sharma has now defended twice against the world’s best finisher in the last over of the IPL. Even though MS has passed his prime, holding the nerves and clinching perfect Yorkers against him in the death is not easy.
Wanindu Hasaranga’s spin choke vs CSK
After the auction, when CSK picked Ashwin and Noor, everyone thought they are gonna choke the opponent with spin in the middle over. But ironically, they are at the receiving end so far. Vignesh Puthur ran through them in the first match, thanks to Rachin for saving the match. Livingstone choked them in the second match, CSK struggled to attack him, and in this match it is Hasaranga.
Wanindu Hasaranga destroyed the CSK’s batting line up yesterday by picking 4 of the top 5 batters. The spinner was brave enough to flight the ball slowly and tempted the batters to go for big shots. He was smashed for some sixes but still he backed his plan of tossing the ball which gave him four wickets.
Three out of his four wickets came in the same pattern. He conceded a six in the previous ball and got the batter in the next delivery. This happened with Shivam Dube, Vijay Shankar, and Ruturaj Gaikwad. All of them smashed a six on the previous ball before getting out for him.
Another spinner, Mahesh Theekshana who plays for RR, is also a former CSK player went wicketless but bowled the crucial 18th over when 47 off 18 was required to win, gave just 8 runs and made the equation more difficult for CSK in last two overs.