Devdutt Padikkal, Shimron Hetmyer and Yashasvi Jaiswal starred with the bat as Rajasthan Royals knocked Punjab Kings out of IPL 2023 on Friday.
The nail-biting four-wicket win in Dharamsala gave Rajasthan a glimmer of hope of qualifying for the knockout phase of the competition although their fate depends on other matches this weekend.
Sam Curran, who cost Punjab a hefty $2.23 million, fell one run short of what would have been only his second 50 of the tournament as Punjab put on 187-5 with Navdeep Saini taking 3-40 for Rajasthan. The innings started with yet another first-over wicket for Trent Boult and PBKS lost four wickets in the first seven overs.
But a stellar finish led by Curran and Shahrukh Khan saw PBKS plunder 46 runs from the last two balls, including a 28-run 19th over by Yuzvendra Chahal.
In reply for the Royals, Curran’s England teammate Jos Buttler fell for his latest duck of his lacklustre back-end of the season, caught leg-before to a vicious inswinger by Kagiso Rabada. It was Buttler’s third duck in a row after he had scored a 95 against SRH, nearly equalling the IPL record for most centuries. That was eventually done by Virat Kohli on Thursday, as he got to his sixth…
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