IPL 2021: RCB top table early as SRH choke after Glenn Maxwell, Shahbaz Ahmed heroics

Bengaluru: It was Kolkata Knight Riders on Tuesday and Sunrisers Hyderabad on the following day as chasing teams choked on successive days in Chennai. David Warner's 49th fifty in the Indian Premier League was not enough as SRH imploded in a span of 6 balls in their chase of 150 against Royal Challengers Bangalore in Match 6 of the 14th season at the MA Chidambaram Stadium.


Bengaluru: It was Kolkata Knight Riders on Tuesday and Sunrisers Hyderabad on the following day as chasing teams choked on successive days in Chennai. David Warner's 49th fifty in the Indian Premier League was not enough as SRH imploded in a span of 6 balls in their chase of 150 against Royal Challengers Bangalore in Match 6 of the 14th season at the MA Chidambaram Stadium.

With the 6-run win, Royal Challengers Bangalore ended their 6-year-long wait for a win in their first two games of an IPL season. Notably, Virat Kohli's men began their campaign with a hard-fought win over Mumbai Indians on April 9.

From 115 for 2 in the 16th over, Sunrisers Hyderabad lost as many as 7 wickets for just 28 runs. At the end of 20 overs, SRH fell short of RCB's 148-run target by 6 runs. Left-arm spinner Shahbaz Ahmed did the star turn for RCB, picking up 3 wickets in the 17th over.

Sunrisers Hyderabad were cruising towards a comfortable victory as David Warner and Manish Pandey stitched an 83-run stand for the 2nd wicket after the early wicket of Wriddhiman Saha. Both Warner and Pandey were hitting them cleanly and it looked like the 2016 champions would set a blueprint for chasing in Chennai after KKR's horror collapse on Tuesday.

Warner got to his 49th IPL fifty but fell right afterwards to New Zealand pacer Kyle Jamieson in the 14th over. However, Jonny Bairstow and Manish Pandey added 19 runs to keep the scoreboard moving. It was still SRH's game to lose and they exactly that by losing the plot in a space of 6 balls.

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The special Shahbaz Ahmed over

Starting afresh has been an issue on sluggish Chepauk wickets in IPL 2021 and Sunrisers Hyderabad paid the price for not having enough game awareness.

Left-arm spinner Shahbaz Ahmed (3/7) was trusted with the responsibility of bowling the 17th over and he delivered with 3 wickets in the over.

The left-arm spinner got Bairstow (12) and Pandey (38) with successive deliveries and dealt another blow by picking up big-hitting Abdul Samad (0) in the 5th delivery of the over.

Experienced campaigners Jason Holder (4) and Vijay Shankar (3) failed to get going and a late burst from Rashid Khan was not enough as the likes of Mohammed Siraj (2/25) and Harshal Patel (2/25) closed out the match with fine 19th and 20th overs.

Glenn Maxwell's rare IPL fifty lifts RCB to 149
Earlier, SRH restricted the famed RCB batting lineup to a par score of 149 for 8 in 20 overs after winning the toss and electing to bowl first at Chepauk. Virat Kohli managed to hit 33 but AB de Villiers got out early to Rashid Khan.

However, Glenn Maxwell, who was bought for Rs 14.25 crore, made another fine early impression with a 41-ball 59. Maxwell provided the much-needed impetus in the middle overs and stayed on till the final over, hitting 3 sixes and 5 boundaries.

It was Maxwell's first fifty in the IPL since 2016 as he looks hungry for more runs in the IPL in RCB colours.

All 5 Hyderabad bowlers finished among the wickets and Jason Holder, who played this game in place of Mohammad Nahi, lead the way with figures of 3 for 30.

Afghanistan leg-spinner Rashid Khan bagged 2 wickets while Bhuvneshwar Kumar, T Natarajan and Shahbaz Nadeem, who replaced Sandeep Sharma in SRH's playing XI, taking a wicket each for the Orange Army.

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