Rajasthan Royals skipper Ajinkya Rahane won the toss and elected to bat first against Kings XI Punjab. Jos Butler and Ajinkya Rahane opened the innings and Marcus Stoinis came to bowl the first over. Rahane pulls off very early. After the end of the powerplay Rajasthan Royals were 63 for 1 with Jos Butler(45 runs off 22 balls) and K Gowtham (8 runs off 4 balls)on the crease.
The spin was doing the trick was KXIP and Ashwin brought Mujeeb ur Rahman to bowl the tenth over and continued with Axar in the 11th one. RR tried really hard to get runs on the scoreboard. They were loosing wickets yet playing hard and they managed to score 158 for 8 wickets which was satisfactory on SMS Stadium, Jaipur.
Buttler added 82 runs of 58 balls, Samson and Stokes added a few more.
Andrew Tye dismissed 4 Royals bu just giving 34 runs.
Now its was to show up in the bowling.
Chasing the modest target of 158 runs, Lokesh Rahul and Chris Gayle opened the innings for Kings XI Punjab while Gowtham came to bowl the first over.
Gayle was stumped in the third over off Gowtham’s bowling. R Ashwin can in to bat, which was a surprise move. However, He did not last long and was clean bowled on the second ball for a duck. Karun Nair was dismissed by Jofra Archer. After 3.4 overs KXIP was 19/3. Akashdeep Nath and KL Rahul been the back of the team and lead it a slow but steady stream. Nath hit the ball high in the air and he went out. Kings were in great trouble. Tiwari couldn’t spend enough time on crease and lost it straight in the hand of mighty captain Rahane. Now the score was 74-1. KL Rahul was still on the pitch who were carrying hope for KXIP fans.
Axar Patel too got runout in making a double. Rajasthan was on fire but Rahul stand tight. It was 5 overs left and still needed 68 runs. Stoinis came in, Pressure was all over the Kings. Four over 61 needed. Here KXIP must have been missing David Miller. Needed 57 in 18 balls. Rahul tried hard but couldn’t make it to 159. After 20 overs the score was 143/7. KL Rahul been the wall for the team. He acquired the ‘orange cap’ by scoring 463 in VivoIpl 2018. Today he made 95(70). In this man there is future of Indian cricket. Class, perfection, modesty and passion, all are poured in this superlative batsman who plays superlative innings.
Off course RR won the match but KL Rahul won hearts 💞.
Ankit Vaishnav
