New Delhi: Riding on the brilliant half-century by Brad Hodge, Rajasthan Royals made it to the qualifiers of IPL as they defeated Sunrisers Hyderabad by four wickets with four balls to spare at Feroze Shah Kotla here on Wednesday.
It was a nail-biting finish as Sunrisers bowled brilliantly but the depth of Rajasthan’s batting was just too good to defend their sharp attack. Darren Sammy tried his level best as he got couple of wickets in quick succession but Hodge displayed some fine batting performance and smashed five sixes in his 54 runs knock which overshadowed the hard-work of SRH.
Earlier, it was some fine bowling from the duo Vikramjeet Malik and Siddharth Trivedi who gave away just 32 runs in their eight overs and gave RR those early breakthroughs.
Cameron White and Darren Sammy made some useful contribution with the bat as they scored 31 and 29 in quick time and allowed their side to reach a total of 132 runs in their 20 overs.
Chasing the target of 133 runs, RR were off to a good start as Rahul Dravid scored three boundaries in quick succession but gave away his wicket after that. But it was Watson who carried out the fireworks as he hit Ishant Sharma for four boundaries in his next two overs. He was undone by Karan Sharma and walked back to dug-out after scoring 24 off 15 balls.
In next three overs, RR sunk into deep trouble as they lost the wickets of Dinesh Yagnik, Ajinkya Rahane and Stuart Binny. RR was 5/57 after the 10th over.
But Brad Hodge showed his utility as match-finisher as he started playing those big shots which gave RR some sigh of relief. The 14th over bowled by Karan was the turning point of the match as Hodge smashed couple of sixes and a four.
Meanwhile, Sanju Samson didn't feel comfortable at the crease and lost his wicket after scoring 10 runs. James Faulkner scored run-a-ball 11 to compliment Hodge as Hodge finally smoked away couple of sixes in final over to win this thriller for RR and take them to the qualifiers.
Earlier, it was some brilliant bowling from Malik which fetched him the wickets of Parthiv Patel and Hanuma Vihari in his first couple of overs. SRH were struggling as they were 2/ 12 after four overs.
But Shikhar Dhawan and Cameron White knitted a brilliant partnership of 43 runs to save them from further humiliation. White departed after scoring 31 runs which was studded with five crisp boundaries.
Dhawan was finding it quite hard to get the boundaries and in his attempt to accelerate the innings, he lost his wicket to Faulkner. He scored 33 runs off 39 balls but Darren Sammy and Thisara Perera scored some quick boundaries which gave SRH the much-needed momentum.
Final over of Watson did put some brakes on SRH’s chances of taking the match away as Sammy departed after scoring 29 runs off 21 balls and was followed by Perera who scored 11 runs off six balls.
SRH scored 19 runs off their last two overs to finish it off with 132 runs in their 20 overs.