Sunrisers Hyderabad 166 for 4 (Markram 50, Abhishek 37, Head 31, Moeen 2-23) beat Chennai Super Kings 165 for 5 (Dube 45, Rahane 35, Bhuvneshwar 1-28, Cummins 1-29) by six wickets
CSK had scored 30 runs fewer in their powerplay and their batting machine was shut down in the slog overs too.
Dube does Dube things
Rachin Ravindra was dismissed by Bhuvneshwar Kumar for 12 off nine balls in the fourth over. Ruturaj Gaikwad got off to a start, but Shahbaz Ahmed, the left-arm fingerspinner, had him swiping a catch to long-on for 26 off 21 balls.
Ajinkya Rahane hit Cummins and Bhuvneshwar over the top for boundaries in the powerplay, but he struggled to get the ball away once it became softer and the field was spread out in the middle overs.
Dube also lined up T Natarajan, who was returning from injury, for back-to-back sixes before Cummins stopped him on 45 off 24 balls. The Sunrisers captain hid a slower short ball away from Dube’s swinging arc and had him popping a catch to backward point.
SRH pin down CSK
CSK could score only 50 runs in their last seven overs. Cummins, Natarajan and Unadkat kept taking pace off the ball. CSK’s power-hitters failed to manufacture pace for themselves on the night.
Rahane was undone by a 105kph slower delivery while Mitchell fell to an on-pace Natarajan delivery that stopped in the pitch. Ravindra Jadeja’s down-the-track swatted four off a 111kph cutter from Unadkat was only an aberration.
The decibel levels soared when MS Dhoni came out to bat at No.7, ahead of Moeen Ali, with just three balls left in CSK’s innings. But even he could manage only one off two balls.
Head, Abhishek tear up the powerplay
With the target in front of them and the knowledge that the pitch would become even slower later in the night, Sunrisers maximised the powerplay.
According to ESPNcricinfo’s logs, Sunrisers attempted to hit 16 balls in the powerplay to the boundary. CSK, on the other hand, had looked to hit only eight balls to the boundary during that phase.
Travis Head stayed leg-side of the ball and cracked Deepak Chahar and Tushar Deshpande through the off side. He finished with 31 off 24 balls. He could have been dismissed on 0 in the very first over had Moeen not dropped him at slip.
After Head and Abhishek departed, Markram controlled the chase with a half-century. Moeen trapped Markram (50) and Shahbaz (18) lbw with the old ball, but it was too late for CSK. Sunrisers had already inflicted irreparable damage in the powerplay.
Deivarayan Muthu is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
