Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy 2018: Favourites Delhi triumph over Rajasthan
Delhi secured their first ever Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy by defeating Rajasthan by 41 runs in the final of the 2018 edition with the vast T20 experience proving handy for Pradeep Sangwan's side in the match held at Eden Gardens on Friday.
Batting first, Delhi scored 153 in their 20 overs with Unmukt Chand scoring a patient half-century and in reply, Rajasthan, who had to do without the services of Deepak Chahar, found the pressure of chasing in the final too much to handle as they were bundled out for a total of 112 runs.
Delhi skipper Pradeep Sangwan won the all-important toss and had no hesitation in deciding to set up a target in the final and the opening pair of Gautam Gambhir and Rishabh Pant got their team off to a flying start, scoring 41 of the first four overs.
With the pacers failing to put a stop on the Delhi scoring, Rajasthan skipper Aniket Choudhary threw the ball to Rahul Chahar and the talented leg-spinner showed exactly why he is someone the IPL franchises will be keeping a close eye on by accounting for Gambhir's stumps with a wicket-maiden.
Delhi was pegged back even further when Pant found himself back in the pavilion just a couple of balls later, caught behind of Khaleel Ahmed's bowling.
Despite the quick dismissals, Delhi consolidated the scoring with Dhruv Shorey and Unmukt Chand adding 48 runs for the third wicket. It was Chahar who got the breakthrough for Rajasthan yet again as the former found himself out of the crease, deceived by a flighted delivery from the leg-spinner.
Wickets kept falling at regular intervals from then on but Chand stood firm at one end, playing a sensible knock to bring up his own half-century as well as helping his side cross the 150-run mark.
Delhi could have scored more but the Rajasthan bowlers did well to restrict the opposition from scoring the big shots, conceding just 32 runs in the final 5 overs.
In reply, Rajasthan got off to a decent start and despite the unlucky dismissal of Ankit Lamba, who scooped a top edge back to Sangwan, they brought up the half-century mark in the seventh over.
Opener Aditya Garhwal was scoring freely at one end but found little support from the other end and once he was dismissed after scoring a 36-ball 52, things went downhill for Rajasthan as they kept losing wickets in a freefall.
With the required run-rate getting out of hand, Rajasthan had little option but to go for the jugular and unfortunately for them, they had little success as they were reduced from 77/2 at one point to 101/9 and ultimately, 112 all out.
It was a perfect bowling performance by Delhi with all the seven bowlers used picking up wickets and it was Sangwan who led from the front with figures of 2/14 from his 4 overs and deservedly picked up the Man-of-the-Match award.
Brief scores:
Delhi 153/6 of 20 overs (Unmukt Chand 53, Gautam Gambhir 27; Khaleel Ahmed 2/23, Rahul Chahar 2/31) beat Rajasthan 112 all out in 19.1 overs (Aditya Garhwal 52, Pradeep Sangwan 2/14, Pawan Negi 2/21)