Steve Smith's Rajasthan Royals have gotten off to a winning start in the 2020 Indian Premier League as they secured a 16-run win over three time champions Chennai Super Kings. Inviting Rajasthan Royals to bat first may have backfired for Chennai Super Kings as Royals and co. posted a gigantic 216/7 on the board. It all started with the 100-plus partnership between the skipper and Man of the Match Sanju Samson. However, CSK did manage to curtail the run rate by picking up wickets in the middle, but some late blitz by Jofra Archer made sure Rajasthan breached the 200-run mark.
For Chennai, Deepak Chahar was the most economical bowler, giving away just 31 runs in his four-over spell. Sam Curran too maintained his form with the ball and returned as the leading wicket-taker from the CSK camp. He picked three wickets in his four overs. Chawla’s first over and Ngidi’s last costed Chennai a whopping 58 runs. Chasing a total in excess of 200 in 20 overs was never going to be an easy task. Chennai needed partnerships which they failed to stitch. The would have expected their opening batters to give them a flying start which did not come. Watson and Vijay stitched a 50-run stand but after the departure of Watson, it was a procession from then on.
Faf du Plessis' (72) and MS Dhoni (29*) partnered well towards the end -- with the latter even hitting three back-to-back sixes in the last over -- but it was too late for CSK for a revival. Rahul Tewatia's three quick wickets in the middle overs tilted favour in the side of the inaugural champions. Other bowlers supported him as Tom Curran. Shreyas Gopal and Jofra Archer all took a wicket each. Only Curran and Unadkat were the ones to conceded over 10 runs an over. Overall they were a good unit on the field holding onto the catches and fielding was too spot-on. In the end, Rajasthan crossed the line with ease.
