Match Review-Rajasthan Royals Vs Chennai Super Kings- Match No.4-IPL 2020

 Welcome Everyone to another Match review, today it is the Chennai Super Kings, who took on the Rajasthan Royals in match number 4 of Dream 11 IPL of 2020.  The game had a lot of expectations, especially the expectations were very high for the Rajasthan Royals who were playing their first match in this years IPL.  Rajasthan with their captain Smith leading from the front were real favourites for this game as their overseas strength is immense.  So now let us get to the toss. 

1.  The Toss:

            The toss was won once again by CSK captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni who once again did the same by bowling first.  The pitch as concerned was really very good for batting first and Dhoni himself said that the pitch could get slower as the game progresses.  But Dhoni believed in his bowlers and had immense trust on his bowlers to restrict RR to a gettable total.

  CSK however missed Ambati Rayudu, who was the spearhead in the middle order, but was not available for today's match because of a small injury as Dhoni said.  In came youngster Ruturaj Gaikwad as Rayudu's Replacement. 

           Rajasthan however, surprised everyone with their team selection.  Stokes and Buttler missed out.  Instead, David Miller and Tom Curran Played in their places.  Also, Yashasvi Jaiswal made his debut in the match.  Rajasthan lacked depth in their batting, but they however had really good top order batsmen.  So let us get straight into the first innings. 

2.  First Innings:

            Rajasthan Royals batted first and in came, young sizzling batsman Yashasvi Jaiswal and experienced Steven Smith, Smith had a taken in a new role of opening the batting in the absence of Jos Buttler.  Yashasvi Jaiswal started off with a bang and scored one boundary in his first five balls.  But his adventure did not last long, he was dismissed off a Deepak Chahar bouncer which took him by surprise and he played a wild pull shot which went straight up and Deepak took a superb catch.  Then came Sanju Samson.  Samson and Smith then joined hands for a glorius 121 run partnership, in which the CSK bowlers were torn apart.

A Partnership For The Ages...

  No matter who is bowling, Sanju Samson, throwing them out of the park.  His knock of 74 in 32 balls consisted of nine Sixes and one four.  He even registered the fastest fifty of this years IPL as he got to the half century mark in just 19 balls.  After his Fifty he slowed up a little bit and even got dismissed of a Ngidi bouncer.

            After his dismissal, the run rate slowed up with Steven Smith being the main source of runs for RR.  RR nearly suffered a small collapse as they scored only 46 runs off the next 7 overs after Samson's Dismissal.  Sam Curran and Chahar pulled the game back in CSK's way but there was more life left in the game.  They came in to the last over with Jofra Archer and Tom Curran at the crease.  Umpires once again messed up at certain points of the game, such as giving Caught behind for Tom Curran who did not hit the ball and the ball pitched before reaching Dhoni's hand.  Like the Delhi Capitals and Kings XI Punjab game, last over in RR's innings was the turning point in the whole game.

            Lungi Ngidi was the bowler and Jofra Archer was the batsman.  The main motive of RR was to get to 200.  But Archer had different ideas.  Archer slotted two maximums in first two balls of Ngidi.  With really big amount of pressure Archer attacked the third ball which also saw it's way into the stands.

  But there was more drama, Ngidi had bowled a No ball.  The free hit saw archer hit another six and Ngidi once again messed it up by bowling another No ball.  So now it is 27 runs scored in 2 balls.  Wow, what a new record, both in IPL and in t20 cricket.  After that Ngidi managed to control the run flow and the over ended after going for 30 runs.  Ngidi's bowling figures were worser than that of Piyush Chawla, who was the weak link.  Archer had hit the longest six which went up to 105 metres.  CSK had to chase a mountain, let us see whether they could.

2.  Second Innings:

                 CSK started off steadily by not losing a single wicket in the powerplay and adding up 53 runs.  Vijay and Watson were playing very steadily and were set after the powerplay.  Watson continued to add to his run tally but Vijay Disappointed everyone by scoring a run a ball 21.  Even after the powerplay Watson displayed some beautiful hits as he scored 28 of his 33 runs in boundaries.  Watson perished to Rahul Tewatia who is the game changer in the second innings.  Whenever Rahul came in to bowl, he would break the momentum of CSK.

Tewatia Power.....

  Faf came in after Vijay's dismissal and Curran came in after Watto's dismissal.  Curran started off with a bang as he scored a six off his first ball.  He continued to attack and in came Tewatia once again.  Curran tried to send tewatia in to the stands but tewatia bowled a superb ball to get Curran stumped.

                 Dhoni then took a strange decision by sending in Ruturaj Gaikwad, who aimed for the skies in his first ball and tewatia beated him beautifully and Samson did the rest.  Then came in Kedar Jadhav, who had no intentions in winning the game.  Faf was struggling to get on with the game and CSK rolled over slowly to a 114 for 14 overs.  Then Dhoni joined Du Plessis and Du Plessis finally shifted gears.  Dhoni let Du Plessis to play the majority of the balls as Du Plessis was drawing CSK back single handedly.  This version of Faf Du Plessis was never seen even for the Proteas as Du Plessis smacked 7 big hits.  Du Plessis had two halves of his innings as his first half was very slow and second half was rapid quick.  Finally he perished to Jofra Archer in the 5th ball of the 19th over.

                Dhoni's performance untill Faf's dismissal was the one that disappointed me as Dhoni ate up too many balls.  In the final over, knowing all hopes are over, Dhoni started to add to the Net Run Rate.  Dhoni demolished Tom Curran for 21 runs which included three consecutive sixes.  One funny incident occured during the game, When Dhoni hit Curran for a six in the last over, one of his sixes went out of the stadium and the ball had made it's way in to the roadway which was by the side of the Stadium.  A man who was going by the Road at that time, picked the ball and started to leave.  But anyhow, CSK's death bowling especially the last over was horrendous as those 30 runs were the game changers.  Archer was the Game Changer both with ball and bat.  CSK's middle order looks very weak without Rayudu.  Finally as i said in my other blog in which i predicted the possible finishing positions of all teams, RR are a very strong team.  And CSK have many things to sort out to go into the play offs.  

Finaly Summary:

           Here are the brief scores of yesterday's game:

            RR: 216/7 20 overs 

            S. Samson: 74(32) ; S. Smith: 69(47)

            CSK: 200/6 20 overs

             F. Du Plessis: 72(37) ; S. Watson: 33(21)

             Man Of The Match: Sanju Samson