Lucknow: Ishan Kishan’s unbeaten 94 saw Sunrisers Hyderabad set a massive total of 231/6 in 20 overs against Royal Challengers Bengaluru in an Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 match at the Ekana Cricket Stadium here on Friday. For the fielding side, Romario Shepherd was the pick of the bowlers with figures for 2014.
Openers Abhishek Sharma (34) and Travis Head (17), like many times before, gave the Sunrisers a flying start. After getting off the mark against Yash Dayal, the duo conjured 18 runs from Bhuvneshwar Kumar’s first over and continued the heavy hitting to raise the 50-run mark in just 15 deliveries.
Just when it seemed the two were on for a big score, RCB scalped both batters in a matter of three deliveries.
In the hope of clearing the boundary at deep backward square-leg, Abhishek flicked Lungi Ngidi’s full-length delivery straight to Phil Salt. Just two deliveries later, it was Bhuvneshwar’s turn to collect, and he claimed the important wicket of Head. A back-of-a-length delivery around off, saw the Aussie opener mistime his shot towards mid-off, where Romario Shepherd collected a simple chance.
Bhuvneshwar nearly struck twice in the same over when Ishan Kishan tried to glance the ball towards fine leg and edged it, but a diving Jitesh Sharma was not able to pick the difficult catch. Heinrich Klassen (24) and Kishan continued dealing in boundaries as the Sunrisers racked up the second-highest Power-play score of the campaign, scoring 71/2 in the opening six overs.
Suyash Sharma’s introduction straight after the Power-play was not too pleasant as the Proteas batter struck him for a four before launching one straight down the ground for half-a-dozen runs.
However, it was the right-arm leg-break bowler who had the last laugh. After having already carved three boundaries on the first four deliveries, Klassen attempted to clear the fielder at the long-on boundary but was caught by Shepherd. The wickets falling at regular intervals did not seem to slow down the galloping scoring rate that the SRH batters had set.
Kishan started the proceedings by hammering a short delivery by Krunal Pandya for six before Aniket Verma (26) joined in with two maximums and a four off Suyash for a 19-run 11th over. The duo similarly dealt with Pandya by getting a six each off his opening three balls.
Aniket’s time at the crease came to an end when a leading edge saw the ball balloon towards backward-point for a simple catch by Bhuvneshwar. Kishan, on the other hand, had no intentions of letting wickets halt the flow of runs and raised his half-century in 28 balls.
Nitesh Kumar Reddy’s (4) lean run of form with the bat continued as the all-rounder was undone by Shepherd. A short delivery, on the slower side, saw Reddy try and pull the ball but was unable to get under it and nicked it to Pandya at short fine leg.
With Kishan firing from the other end, Abhinav Manohar (12) struggled to get going, and it was once again Shepherd who got the vital breakthrough for RCB. Kishan punished Buvneshwar’s low full-toss and brought up SRH’s 200, with two overs to go, with a six over long-on.
Skipper Pat Cummins (13*) smashed Ngidi for a six before being dropped by the bowler after the Aussie skied the ball towards mid-off, who could not settle himself in time. Things went worse for RCB when Tim David seemingly pulled his hamstring on the first ball of the final over and was forced to go off the field.
Kishan ended the inning just short of the century landmark and took SRH to 231/6 in 20 overs with a four and a six off Yash Dayal’s final over. He ended with 94* off 48, in an innings laced with seven boundaries and five sixes.
Brief scores:
Sunrisers Hyderabad 231/6 in 20 overs (Ishan Kishan 94*, Abhishek Sharma 34, Aniket Verma 26; Romario Shepherd 2-14) vs Royal Challengers Bengaluru.
(IANS)
