Kevon Cooper's brilliant last over helps Rajasthan clinch thriller
Given
the task of bowling the final over where Delhi needed just nine runs to
win, Cooper dismissed Botha (2) with his third ball and with six to win
off two balls, sent back his West Indies counterpart Andre Russell (7).
NEW DELHI: Kevon Cooper is a largely unknown quantity. The Trinidad and Tobago allrounder has done very little in this event apart from briefly shining for Rajasthan last year.
After a spectacular start in 2012, when he picked up seven wickets in his first two matches, Cooper fell off the radar when he was sidelined with a fractured right knee. On Saturday, he pulled a rabbit out of the hat by bowling a dream last over as Rajasthan secured an unlikely five-run win at the Feroz Shah Kotla.
Given the task of bowling the final over where Delhi needed just nine runs to win, Cooper dismissed Botha (2) with his third ball and with six to win off two balls, sent back his West Indies counterpart Andre Russell (7).
Delhi almost had the match in the bag with David Warner leading the stiff 166-run chase. Warner had the Kotla crowd swooning to his tune with his 56-ball 77 (1x6, 9x4) but his run out changed things as Delhi succumbed to their second defeat of the tournament.
The needless run out of Warner with just 13 runs to win came back to haunt Delhi.
It was a chanceless knock apart from a drop by Rahul Dravid at gully off Sreesanth when on two. Dravid was off the field for the rest of the innings after having landed awkwardly trying to take the catch. Warner opened up after his skipper Mahela Jayawardene's departure (19; 16b, 1x4) reaching his seventh fifty in the league off just 41 balls.
Earlier, Rajasthan skipper Rahul Dravid started off in the same vein as last year in his sixth season of the tournament. His methods might have been a bit crude and not quite out of the manual but results were effective nonetheless as his 51-ball 65 (2x6, 6x4) set the platform for an impressive 165/7 after Rajasthan elected to bat first.
On the day, all the calculated risks paid off as Dravid as he raced to his eighth fifty in the tournament off just 40 balls. It was his third-wicket partnership with Stuart Binny (40; 20b, 3x6, 2x4) which produced 55 runs in just 28 balls that gave Rajasthan a major push.
The target could have been for the home side, who had Umesh Yadav to thank for stopping the slide. The Nagpur paceman, returning from a back injury, looked much more impressive in his second match of the tournament, scalping 4/24 in his four overs.
Yadav mixed up his pace well, cranking it up to 147kph to keep the batsmen in check on a batting paradise. His twin strikes in the 19th over of the innings -- when he dismissed Dravid and Brad Hodge (5) off successive deliveries -- gave Delhi some relief. Ashish Nehra (2/35) complemented Yadav by bowling an excellent last over, picking up two wickets.
After a spectacular start in 2012, when he picked up seven wickets in his first two matches, Cooper fell off the radar when he was sidelined with a fractured right knee. On Saturday, he pulled a rabbit out of the hat by bowling a dream last over as Rajasthan secured an unlikely five-run win at the Feroz Shah Kotla.
Given the task of bowling the final over where Delhi needed just nine runs to win, Cooper dismissed Botha (2) with his third ball and with six to win off two balls, sent back his West Indies counterpart Andre Russell (7).
Delhi almost had the match in the bag with David Warner leading the stiff 166-run chase. Warner had the Kotla crowd swooning to his tune with his 56-ball 77 (1x6, 9x4) but his run out changed things as Delhi succumbed to their second defeat of the tournament.
The needless run out of Warner with just 13 runs to win came back to haunt Delhi.
It was a chanceless knock apart from a drop by Rahul Dravid at gully off Sreesanth when on two. Dravid was off the field for the rest of the innings after having landed awkwardly trying to take the catch. Warner opened up after his skipper Mahela Jayawardene's departure (19; 16b, 1x4) reaching his seventh fifty in the league off just 41 balls.
Earlier, Rajasthan skipper Rahul Dravid started off in the same vein as last year in his sixth season of the tournament. His methods might have been a bit crude and not quite out of the manual but results were effective nonetheless as his 51-ball 65 (2x6, 6x4) set the platform for an impressive 165/7 after Rajasthan elected to bat first.
On the day, all the calculated risks paid off as Dravid as he raced to his eighth fifty in the tournament off just 40 balls. It was his third-wicket partnership with Stuart Binny (40; 20b, 3x6, 2x4) which produced 55 runs in just 28 balls that gave Rajasthan a major push.
The target could have been for the home side, who had Umesh Yadav to thank for stopping the slide. The Nagpur paceman, returning from a back injury, looked much more impressive in his second match of the tournament, scalping 4/24 in his four overs.
Yadav mixed up his pace well, cranking it up to 147kph to keep the batsmen in check on a batting paradise. His twin strikes in the 19th over of the innings -- when he dismissed Dravid and Brad Hodge (5) off successive deliveries -- gave Delhi some relief. Ashish Nehra (2/35) complemented Yadav by bowling an excellent last over, picking up two wickets.
.
0 comments:
Post a Comment