IPL: Shakib, Rashid star as Sunrisers defend another low total

Sunrisers Hyderabad 132 for 6 (Pandey 54, Shakib 28, Rajpoot 5-14) beat Kings XI Punjab 119 (Rahul 32, Rashid 3-19, Shakib 2-18) by 13 runs

No Billy Stanlake and Bhuvneshwar Kumar? No problem, again. Two nights after defending 118 – their second-lowest total in the IPL – Sunrisers Hyderabad defended 132 to snap Kings XI Punjab’s four-match winning streak. That they could pull off another coup seemed improbable when Ankit Rajpoot’s 5 for 14 – the best figures in IPL 2018 and the sixth best overall – pinned Sunrisers down to 132 for 6. It seemed as improbable when KL Rahul and Chris Gayle, the most prolific opening pair this season, raised their fourth fifty-plus stand in as many innings opening together.

Enter Rashid Khan, the No.1 T20 bowler right now, and the experienced Shakib Al Hasan. They ran rings around Kings XI’s line-up and threatened both edges. Sandeep Sharma did his bit with knuckle balls. And, just like that, there was a slip breathing down the batsman’s neck. Just like that, Kings XI’s chase unravelled: from 55 for 0 they imploded to 101 for 9. Mujeeb Ur Rahman then hacked and reverse-swept his way to 10 off five balls – his first runs in T20 cricket – and reduced the equation to 15 off the last over. The first ball of that from Basil Thampi was a sharp inswinging yorker, which thudded into the pads of Mujeeb, who sneaked in a leg bye. Thampi then nailed the base of Rajpoot’s middle stump to cap Sunrisers’ comeback and move them to second on the points table. (Excerpt from ESPNcricinfo)