Delhi Capitals (DC) succumbed to their second successive loss in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 season when they went down to Gujarat Titans (GT) by six wickets on Tuesday at the Ferozeshah Kotla grounds of the Arun Jaitley Stadium.
DC batting failed to build on a good start and the bowling once again lacked the teeth to bowl out the opposition.
Put into bat, DC began on a strong note reaching 20 in two overs and then picking another nine on the first three balls of the third over before Prithvi Shaw’s dismissal put the skids on the run rate. Shaw had struggled to get going and was out after miscuing a pull off Mohammed Shami (3/41). Shami then had Mitchell Marsh bowled for just four.
The twin blows made DC work on resurrecting the innings with skipper David Warner (37 off 32 balls) and Sarfaraz Khan (30 off 34) adding 30 in four overs. But just as they looked like pulling the team out of trouble, Warner was bowled by GT’s West Indian pacer Alzarri Joseph (2/29), his angled bat directing the ball onto the stumps.
Joseph had Rilee Rossouw caught at point off the next delivery which was a snorter. It left DC on the backfoot.
Abhishek Porel, who came into the squad in place of Rishabh Pant, hit a couple of sixes and Sarfaraz Khan with Axar Patel (36 off 22) tried to reconstruct the innings but with not much batting depth in the last half of the innings, it was always tough to take the score close to the challenging 180. Rashid Khan was the other bowler besides Shami to return a three-wicket haul (3/31) for GT.
Gujarat franchise’s start was a mixed one. They got quick early runs – 22 off first two overs – but two sharp, incoming deliveries from Anrich Nortje (2/39) removed the openers Wriddhiman Saha (14) and Shubman Gill (14).
Soon Hardik Pandya was dismissed by Khaleel Ahmed (1/38) on the last ball of the powerplay with the score on 54.
However, 21-year-old left-hander Sai Sudharshan (62 not out off 48 balls) and Vijay Shankar (29 off 23) kept GT on track before David Miller (31 not out off 16 balls, 2x4s, 2x6s) fireworks towards the end sealed the game in Gujarat’s favour.
DC are yet to open their account in the points table after two games.
