Jaipur: Rajasthan Royals registered another emphatic win as they ousted Delhi Daredevils at Sawai Mansingh Stadium here by nine wickets in a one-sided affair. It was once again the opening duo of Rahul Dravid and Ajinkya Rahane who put up a brilliant opening stand of 108 runs to make sure that RR reach the target of 155 runs quite convincingly. Rahane scored 63 runs off 45 balls whereas Dravid smashed 53 runs off 48 balls he faced.
Earlier, it was Ben Rohrer and Kedar Jadhav who knitted a beautiful partnership of 66 runs for the fifth wicket and took their side to 154 runs in their 20 overs. However the efforts of Ben Rohrer and Mahela Jayawardene, who scored 64 and 34 runs respectively, went in vain.
Chasing the target of 154, Rajasthan Royals started off slowly but very soon accelerated with flurry of boundaries from Rahane and Dravid. After that they kept toying the Daredevils with their magical batting and in no time they put up partnership of 108 runs and sealed the fate of the match. Dravid departed after scoring 53 runs as Siddharth Kaul did an excellent work with the ball on his debut.
But Rahane held the innings together and brought up his fifty and went onto bag the man-of-the-match award for his brilliant 63 runs. This was his second consecutive fifty. Shane Watson batted brilliantly and scored 28 runs off 14 balls and led Rajasthan to a much needed win.
Earlier, it was the Delhi Daredevils who started the proceedings with Mahela Jayawardene and Virender Sehwag. They added just 19 runs for the opening stand before Sehwag was undone by Faulkner in the second over of the innings. After that it was the Rajasthan who got on the top as they took the wickets of CM Gautam and David Warner which created much more pressure on them. Jayawardene departed after scoring 34 runs and he was dismissed by Siddharth Trivedi.
Ben Rohrer and Kedar Jadhav kept the price on their wickets and took their team to a respectable total of 154 runs. Rohrer played a crackling innings of 64 runs which was studded with nine fours and one six whereas Jadhav contributed 23 runs off 21 balls.
By ISN