Kolkata: Defending champions Sunrisers Hyderabad put on a spirited performance to go past the Delhi Daredevils by a narrow 15-run margin at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad. In reply to Sunrisers’ 191/4, the Daredevils could only muster 176/5 in their allotted 20 overs.
Home team skipper David Warner won the toss and chose to bat first. But he himself was dismissed pretty cheaply quite early on the innings as Shikhar Dhawan (70) joined forces with Kane Williamson to build a solid foundation. The duo batted till 16.1 overs and put on a strong 136-run partnership. And courtesy some power hitting by Moises Henriques and Deepak Hooda, the Sunrisers ended up with 191 runs on the board.
Kane Williamson played his first match of the season and he never looked to be out of touch as his sense of timing and placement fetched him a classy 89. For the Daredevils, Chris Morris was the most successful bowler having scalped four wickets for just 26 runs in his quota of four overs.
In reply, the Delhi openers failed to put up a good start as debutant Mohammed Siraj sent back Sam Billings early. A 71 run stand between Sanju Samson and Karun Nair revived the innings but the wicket of Rishabh Pant was a big setback for Zaheer Khan’s men.
And despite a good 50 from Shreyas Iyer towards the end of the innings, Delhi failed to cross the line as they fell short by just 15 runs. Bhuvneshwar Kumar continued his good form with the ball and an excellent last over by Sidharth Kaul sealed a victory for the defending champs.
With this win, the Sunrisers Hyderabad move to the second spot in the league table with eight points to their name, while the Delhi Daredevils are at the fourth position with just four points from the five games they have played so far.
Brief scores:
Sunrisers Hyderabad 191/4 (Kane Williamson 89, Shikhar Dhawan 70; Chris Morris 4/26) beat Delhi Daredevils 176/5 (Shreyas Iyer 50, Sanju Samson 42; Mohammed Siraj 2/39) by 15 runs.