A 72-run opening stand between David Warner and Jonny Bairstow had set the platform for the other Sunrisers batsmen to build on but they imploded on home turf.
The Delhi Capitals bowlers upstaged their Sunrisers Hyderabad counterpart to help them to a third-straight win and move to second in the standings with a 39-run win on Sunday.
A 72-run opening stand between David Warner and Jonny Bairstow had set the platform for other to follow-up on but instead they imploded.
On the other hand, Capitals’ bowlers didn’t get deterred and reined them in. As a result, for 27 balls from over 6.4 Sunrisers didn’t manage to hit a boundary and with pressure piling up they lost Jonny Bairstow (41) and skipper Kane Williamson (3) – both of them dismissed by Keemo Paul (3/17) -- during that period. Warner tried to break the shackles but looked energy-snapped.
His 47-ball 51 wasn’t one of his fluent innings in this edition of the IPL. He had couple of reprieves as well – one miss-hit falling just short of deep mid-wicket and few delivers later a full-blooded shot hit straight back couldn’t stick in Amit Mishra’s hand.
But the Australian southpaw’s luck ran out soon after reach his fifty, holing out of the bowling of Kagiso Rabada, failing to judge a slower one, at mid-off. They very next ball Vijay Shankar perished and win it diminished any chances of Sunrisers fightback. Sunrisers lost seven wickets in space of just 10 runs folding out at 116.
Coach Tom Moody had admitted during the pre-match press conference that middle-order is a cause for concern for them and they did ring in the changes for this match. Skipper Williamson, playing only his second match this season, looked rusty. Vijay Shankar after doing well initially has struggled to get going.
Ricky Bhui and Abhishek Sharma brought in place of Manish Pandey and Yusuf Pathan struggled throughout their brief stay.
While Paul and Rabada had got Capitals to the finish line, Chris Morris’ triple strike in the 18thover virtually killed any chances of Sunrisers mounting a late comeback.
One of the concerns for Capitals will be the failures of their batsmen to build on the starts, especially Shreyas Iyer and Rishab Pant. Both have just one fifties to their credit. While 30s are considered respectable the think-tank would like to finish off the innings rather than giving away their wickets.
Earlier, Sunrisers bowling once again delivered by restricting Delhi Capitals to 155. Leading the pack was Khaleel Ahmed, who was playing his first match of the tournament. The left-arm pacer bowled with pace and accuracy to trouble the Capitals’ batsmen. Bhuvneshwar Kumar took was on the money, bowling the best spell of this IPL.