Shikhar Dhawan (92 off 49 balls) masterminded a brilliant run-chase by Delhi Capitals as they overhauled a steep target of 196 by Punjab Kings to win a high-scoring thriller by six wickets at the Wankhede Stadium today.
Read the full story here: https://bit.ly/3turKiT
Subscribe to Gulf News on YouTube and watch more of our videos: https://www.youtube.com/user/GulfNewsTV
See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos
Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km
#UAEnews #IPL2021 #cricket
Read the full story here: https://bit.ly/3turKiT
Subscribe to Gulf News on YouTube and watch more of our videos: https://www.youtube.com/user/GulfNewsTV
See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos
Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km
#UAEnews #IPL2021 #cricket
Category
🗞
NewsTranscript
00:00I think it's definitely got to be Glenn Maxwell. This guy, he has not scored a 50 for a while and now he's stepped up this tournament.
00:08He's just killed it for the RCBN. You know, with not only Maxwell and RCBN, they've got, of course, ABD, Kohli.
00:14So, you know, this is an explosive team and a very fun team to watch. And on their day, they will ruin every team.
00:20But what about your KKR? What's happening with your KKR? Gautam and Sahil?
00:30Hello, good evening. Welcome to another edition of the Straight Bad Show with Gulf News and Mr. Cricket QAE.
00:42This is Gautam of Gulf News. With me, I've got my senior colleague, Shyam Krishna.
00:47And of course, apart from Anees, we have got Mobin Agha, one of our proud winners of the jacket,
00:54which you need to just win and, you know, predict the winner and win one of these lovely jackets
01:00on our social media platform. And of course, Sahil Sajan, who had been a regular in our shows.
01:07Before we start, I would like to ask Anees to take us through a bit about this contest,
01:13which has been the kind of response that it had been generating.
01:17Hello, beautiful people of the Gulf News community. Every day you have a contest on the Gulf News page.
01:22Predict the winner of the match on that particular day. And you walk away with this beautiful jacket,
01:26rather two winners in this beautiful jacket and three months of subscription. So make sure to
01:31log on to your favorite page, gulfnews.com every day and win these exciting prizes. Gautam.
01:37Thank you so much. Of course, two games, two tall scoring games. In fact, for a change,
01:46Chennai has also got also saw a high scoring game today. So I'll come back to Anees.
01:51So Bangalore, I mean, looking, they have never had as good a start as before. Three wins out of three.
01:58So what do you make out of it? I mean, there's still a long way to go. I mean,
02:02sometimes teams are flattered to be seen. What do you think?
02:06Well, honestly, when I saw Virat Kohli winning the toss and deciding to bat, I was quite happy
02:12because the curators or rather the specialist had said that it's going to be a dry wicket.
02:17And the moment the mystery spinner Varun Chakravorty got two wickets, I felt that the
02:22decision has backfired. But the mistake made by Owen Morgan that he did not continue with Varun
02:28Chakravorty. He just gave him one over and brought him after six overs. And by that time, Maxwell was
02:33set. And when Maxwell gets set, he's the showman, as they say. And in the end, you had to just
02:38watch and admire the innings of the great 360 degree players, AB de Villiers, who made batting
02:43look simple on this dry wicket so easy that they ended up scoring a mammoth total of 200.
02:50Shyam, what's your take? Bangalore, I know, is one of your favorite teams.
02:54So what do you make out of it? Yeah, I wouldn't say favorite. Yes,
02:59I mean, they're favorites to make the knockout. But still, I would say that they're not,
03:04you could say they won three games, all the games, actually, all the three games. But
03:09still, it's not as dominating as I would expect. But this was indeed a top-notch performance today.
03:17Right. Well, quickly moving on to the second game. If we get time, we'll, of course, come back to the
03:24Bangalore show once more. Delhi Capitals, they had a hiccup in the previous game. But
03:32today, they showed how much is a big target on helpful batting conditions. And of course,
03:37Shikhar Dhawan seems to be getting better with age. What do you make of it?
03:44Well, Punjab should have scored more than 200 runs. They were at least batting at around 11
03:51runs per over. And without a loss, they had scored a century. According to me, they should have scored
03:57at least around 225. Pulling them down to 195 by Delhi Capitals, that was a good bowling performance
04:03from them. And then, the batting of Shikhar Dhawan. Right. Sahil, I'll come to you. You know,
04:12this Punjab, they often have had this issue in the past. I mean, they've got nearly
04:18200, 190-plus runs, but they've failed to defend. So, do you see something like this again coming
04:26back to kind of haunt them this season? Honestly, yes. Because now they've introduced two new
04:33bowlers to the IPL. Jaya Richardson and Riley Meredith. They're new to this contest. Yes,
04:37they've done well for Australia. Jaya Richardson has done well for Australia. And Riley Meredith
04:42has also done well in the Big Bash. But this is a completely different league. The IPL is a much
04:46tougher league. So, yes, I think Punjab will still struggle towards the end of the IPL. And also,
04:52today, not only them, even Mohammed Shami had a terrible day in the office. So, I see Punjab
04:56struggling. Right. But, Anish, the thing is, today, both these matches, you know, the four
05:05teams on display, they kind of showed the standard to which the IPL can generally go,
05:13you know, tall scoring games. But then again, KKR seems to be getting into that warp,
05:20something is getting wrong after the initial start of one game only. So,
05:26how do you explain it to you? Well, first, let me talk about the KKR versus RCB game. You know,
05:32not all is looking rosy in their camp. If you must have realized in the last year, in the middle of
05:37the tournament, they switched the captainship to Owen Morgan. And they thought that things might
05:43change. But unfortunately, KKR missed the boat. They were almost there to make the knockoff. But
05:48the last game, Sunrise has won. If you talk about this year, I am afraid, after winning the first
05:54game, the second game against Mumbai, which they should have won, they tried to play the Gango
05:58style of England cricket. And that actually cost them that game. Because at one stage, they required
06:03an average of probably 6 or 6.5, which you mentioned yesterday. And today, again, Owen Morgan,
06:08as I said, missed the trick by not getting Varun Chakravarty. So, probably, they are still not
06:14able to plan what exactly they need to do. And as you said, they look good on paper,
06:19but they're not able to execute. So, worrying sign. And for Punjab, I'm afraid, like Sahil
06:24mentioned, the two new bowlers, the Australian fast bowlers, they are not able to hit the right
06:28length. And now they're going to go to Chennai. And I'm not sure whether they have any good spinner
06:32apart from Vishnoy to do the tricks. Yeah. Shyam, if you watch the second game,
06:40you see, they tried Punjab, you know, Jalaj Saxena. Now, this player had been
06:48apparently doing quite well at the domestic level for MP. So, Jalaj and
06:54Deepak Khuda, another part-time spinner for your spinners. I mean, when you had Ravi Vishnoy,
07:01when you had Murugan Ashwin, what kind of a gamble was that, Shyam? I mean,
07:06were they looking for the extra batting or what? Actually, I was quite surprised that they're not
07:12playing Ravi Vishnoy because Ravi Vishnoy played all the games last season. Yeah, he did well.
07:18Yeah, exactly. And I was sort of quite surprised why he didn't play up till now. Maybe we'll see
07:23more of him in like Anish Bhai said, more of that maybe in Chennai. But right here,
07:31even here, I would have expected him to play. Okay, if you wanted. But again, Jalaj Saxena,
07:37he said he's an MP player. Jalaj Saxena plays for Kerala. And yes, he's got a tremendous domestic
07:43record. But IPL is a different ball game. Also, not just that, today's game, the way the Delhi
07:51were dominating, I don't think the bowlers would matter, actually. The way, actually,
07:56Shikha Dhawan was toying with the ball. He could bowl anywhere and he could put it anywhere he
08:00wanted. So I think today, irrespective of the bowler, he was just on top. But coming to
08:07yours, the question about the spinners, I would have expected at least Gautam or Ravi Vishnoy.
08:12If they don't want to play Gautam, they should have played Ravi Vishnoy. I was actually surprised.
08:18Right. Sahil, you see, we have crossed the first week of IPL. Just randomly,
08:27who do you think, who would be your star performer of the week?
08:32Star performer of the week? I think it's definitely got to be Glenn Maxwell. This guy,
08:36he has not scored a 50 for a while. And now he stepped up this tournament. He's just killed it
08:42for the RCB. And with not only Maxwell and RCB, they've got, of course, ABD, Kohli. So this is
08:48an explosive team and a very fun team to watch. And on their day, they will ruin every team.
08:53But what about your KKR? What's happening with your KKR? Gautam and Sahil? What has happened
08:58to your team? KKR, when are they going to pull up their socks? I feel the KKR is not a good team.
09:04And I don't think they'll make it. It's difficult. See, this year, the team looked better on paper
09:10because of some balance, which they managed to add with Sakibal Hassan coming. But ultimately,
09:15you got to deliver. So far, I don't see that in them. I mean, they are losing steam with each
09:22match. I hope they're able to come back in the next one. And just because it's time of taking
09:30stock after about the first week, I would also like to ask you, who's your star performer,
09:37instead of taking it match by match? You mean to say as an individual or a team?
09:42As an individual. As an individual, who do you think caught the eye, who made the difference?
09:47I think Sahil had a very good choice in Glenn Maxwell.
09:51I endorse what Sahil says because from the game one against Mumbai, he looked in good touch.
09:58And he made a very big statement that he's given a role by RCB and he's able to play according to
10:04that role. And when a team gives a role, now I'm glad you asked me this question. We are talking
10:09about Glenn Maxwell. But whether we talk about Punjab, or whether we talk about KKR, they have
10:15solid players. So when you have solid players, you have to make sure that you give them roles.
10:19I remember talking to Stephen Fleming. Sorry, I'm taking a bit long, but I need to say this.
10:26Stephen Fleming, we all know he's one of the finest coaches in the world around.
10:30And I always ask him that, how do you select these teams? He said, when we select teams,
10:34we select players and define them roles. That X player has been taken for this role,
10:39Y player has been taken for this role. And that role has been given to them. And if they execute
10:43well, if they do not execute, you can't do anything about it. But everybody is given a role,
10:48and they need to make sure that they execute. And the problem with Punjab, or the RRs,
10:53or KKR this time around, I'm afraid they have players, but they need to be given a proper role.
10:58Let's take the example of Russell coming at number seven, when you're chasing 200.
11:02That's not done. You got to push him a little ahead if you're chasing 200 runs.
11:08Yeah, Russell, I mean, today, in the three games, he was batting like the Russell we know.
11:14Shyam, do you think he should bat up? I mean, like, they still have this, you know,
11:19dilemma about their batting order? No, I guess, and he's made a very valid point.
11:25Because it's almost like they have a set plan, and they refuse to budge from it.
11:30See, any team has to be flexible and has to change according to the demands of the situation.
11:37Today was a classic case where Russell could have been pushed up. Because, see, they're
11:42chasing 200-plus, so they need to judge, I mean, shake things up a bit. And Russell would have been
11:48perfect if he had come up at least number four, if he was there. I think he would have made a
11:53difference. And we might have had a different game on our hands. Right. Mubin, you wanted to
11:58ask something. Go ahead. I think Mubin wanted to throw a question to you, Gautam. Yes, Mubin.
12:04This is about KKR, Andre Russell. Isn't he performing not well, even from last year?
12:13And even his bowling is too predictable, coming around the wicket and just throwing it
12:19around outside the upsterm. So isn't he too predictable? AB de Villiers took him today
12:24for granted and he hit him all over the parks. This two overs cost him around 38 runs.
12:30Yes, see, you can say that because every team is constantly dissecting your performance.
12:36But there is also an element of predictability about bowling in T20s. Ultimately,
12:43it's the defensive bowling in T20s which makes the difference for you.
12:46I mean, unless you can come up with a spell like Dipak Chahar or you have some exceptional
12:54spells. Last year, I remember Mamma Shiraj, one of his spells against KKR. I mean,
13:00that was the one which saw him through to the Indian team. And having said that,
13:08you need AB to make a misfit out of those wide Yorkers or whatever you try and bowl of him
13:15because of the flexibility that he has. That's why he is AB. That's one. So I think with these
13:23two matches, there has been plenty to talk about. But before we wrap up, just throwing this one
13:29question. Tomorrow, Chennai are coming back in action again and they're taking on Rajasthan
13:35Royals. So what do you think is going to happen? Well, again, they play at Mumbai. Chennai must
13:42be very confident after that humping victory against Punjab, whereas Rajasthan Royal also
13:47has come on the back of a victory against Delhi. But thanks to Morris that they pulled off that
13:52victory. If you have to pick one team out of the two teams, obviously CSK go into the game
13:56as favourites. But mind you, RR has the firepower. They have the Samsons. They have the Morris.
14:02They need to make sure that they play according to the situation. If they find that the wicket
14:06is like today, they can go bang bang. But when they realise there is a little bit of nip,
14:10there is something in the wicket, they need to respect that and then play according to the
14:14situation. A lot of interesting points today. Before we wrap up, just once again, a reminder
14:22to all of you to take part in the predict the winner contest for this lovely Gulf News jackets
14:30and the subscription of Gulf News for three months. Follow the IPL coverage on our social
14:36media platforms, gulfnews.com for the live. And till then, see you tomorrow evening after the
14:43game. Tomorrow again, we're back to one game. One more thing, Gautam. Very good to have Shyam.
14:50He's one of the senior editors of Gulf News like Gautam. So we need his inputs and we'll be very
14:55happy. And like Mubin, any and everybody who wins the contest gets a chance to participate in this
15:00chat show. So we say a lot of people to come and log on to gulfnews.com, predict the winner. And
15:06if you're the winner, you get a chance to come on the show. Yes. Thank you so much. I mean,
15:13I think as we go on and the level of engagement also increases. So there we are, hoping to see
15:21what today we have got the 11th match was played. So around 49 exciting matches still to go. Till
15:29then, good night and goodbye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye. Bye-bye, guys.