IPL 2022: Jansen, Natarajan shine as Sunrisers thrash Royal Challengers by nine wickets

Mumbai, April 23 (IANS): Marco Jansen landed the early blows and T Natarajan wiped off the lower-order in a brilliant display of medium pace bowling to restrict Royal Challengers for 68 as Sunrisers Hyderabad romped to a 9-wicket victory in Match 36 at the Brabourne Stadium here on Saturday.

The Sunrisers bowlers came up with a brilliant display as they bowled good line and length and used the conditions well to never allow Royal Challengers to recover. The Bangalore side finished with 68, the lowest total in IPL 2022 so far. They also hold the unwanted record of scoring the lowest total in IPL history — 49 against Kolkata Knight Riders on this same day in 2017.

On Saturday, Jansen claimed 3/25, claiming all three of his victims in his first over itself, the second of the innings, as he dismissed Faf du Plessis (5), Virat Kohli (0) and Anuj Rawat (0) as Royal Challengers were reduced to 8/3 at the end of the second over from which they never recovered.

Nataraj got into the act in the middle overs as he ended with 3/10, and with Jagadeesha Suchith (2/12) and Umran Malik maintaining the pressure, Royal Challengers just could not recover and continued to slump in the abyss.

Chasing 69 to win, Sunrisers did not face any trouble as Abhishek Sharma blasted 47 off 28 deliveries and SRH raced to 72/1 in 8 overs as they romped home to a nine-wicket victory with 72 balls remaining. Skipper Kane Williamson remained not out with 16 off 17 deliveries and Rahul Tripathi was not out on 7 off three balls as Sunrisers scored the biggest win of IPL 2022.

After Mohammad Siraj gave only one run in his first over and Hazlewood maintained the tempo, Abhishek Sharma waded into the Aussie quick on the last ball of the second over by whacking him for a boundary wide of mid-on.

In Hazlewood’s next over, Sharma hammered him for two fours and a six — the maximum coming as a superb shot over extra-cover off a length ball angled wide across. He struck Hazlewood for two fours in the fourth over and then meted out the same treatment to Harshal Patel off successive deliveries in the next over as Royal Challengers’ hopes of making things difficult in the small chase did not materialize.

Abhishek Sharma hammered Hazlewood for two more fours in the sixth over before getting out, caught by Anuj Rawat off Harshal Patel. But by that time the writing was already on the wall for Royal Challengers with Sunrisers reaching 64/1 in the eighth over. Skipper Williamson and Rahul Tripathi saw them through with no difficulty.

Royal Challengers had slumped to their lowest ever total on April 23, 2017, and five years later they suffered another humiliating defeat as nothing went right for them at the Brabourne Stadium on Saturday.

However, things looked normal when their openers Faf du Plessis and Anuj Rawat stepped into the field after Sunrisers skipper Kane Williamson won the toss and invited them to bat first.

Du Plessis struck Bhuvneshwar Kumar for a boundary past the cover fielder in the first over. But his innings ended off the second ball of the second over when Jansen rattled his stumps, squaring him up with one that held its line as the batter played the wrong line.

Virat Kohli got out for a golden duck off the next delivery, pushing at a delivery that angled away from him, Aiden Markram pouching a neat catch at second slip.

Glenn Maxwell survived the hat-trick ball and then scored a single but Rawat fell off the last ball of the over in a replay of Kohli’s dismissal as Jansen got one to move away and the ball took an edge to Markram.

It was a brilliant display of swing bowling, as Jansen kept the batters guessing with subtle changes and Royal Challengers were in deep trouble at 8/3.

It was 4/20 soon as Maxwell drove uppishly off Natarajan and Williamson scooped up the catch inches above the ground. Suyash Prabhudessai and Shahbaz Ahmed took them to 47 when the batter from Goa tried to jump out to Suchith and failed to make the ground as Nicholas Pooran effected a neat stumping.

For RCB, it all depended on Dinesh Karthik and Shahbaz Ahmed, who have rescued them from difficult situations twice in IPL 2022. But Saturday was not their day as they failed to perform the Houdini act once again. Karthik was out for a duck, the third RCB batter to score zero, surviving three deliveries. He went for a sweep as Suchith sent one wide down leg side but only managed a faint edge, which was caught by DRS and Karthik had to go back into the dugout and with his departure, RCB’s faint hopes of putting up a decent total too receded.