The Delhi Daredevils signed off their Delhi leg of Pepsi IPL 2015 in style after they registered a resounding nine-wicket win over the Kings XI Punjab at the Ferozeshah Kotla. After opting to field, the hosts did remarkably well to restrict the visitors to a modest 118 for 8, and then knocked off the required runs in fourteen overs. The win was DD’s fourth in eight matches this season, while KXIP suffered their sixth defeat in eight matches and are now faced with an uphill task of having to win at least five of their remaining six matches for them to progress to the Playoffs.

The hosts struck with the second delivery of the match when Zaheer Khan – playing his first competitive match in close to a year – had Virender Sehwag caught at cover point. Shaun Marsh was trapped LBW by JP Duminy in the second over. The DD left-arm quick struck again in his second over when he had Manan Vohra edging one to the wicket-keeper. 10 for three became ten for four three balls later when Wriddhiman Saha edged Nathan Coulter-Nile to Kedar Jadhav with the gloves.

There was a brief period of respite for the visitors when skipper George Bailey and David Miller added 27 runs. Just when it appeared that KXIP had started to get their grip on the match, Bailey attempted to sweep an Amit Mishra delivery, didn’t make contact and was rapped on the pads in front of his stumps; he made 18 from 16 balls and struck three boundaries. There was further trouble for the visitors when Thisara Perera was dismissed shortly after with the score reading 45.

Miller and Axar Patel stitched together a partnership that was chiefly responsible in giving their team a respectable total. Miller had crawled to 17 from 25 balls, holding his end up, before opening his shoulders in the latter half of the innings. He hit two boundaries in the fifteenth over bowled by Angelo Mathews, and followed it up with a six and a four off Imran Tahir. The South African was dismissed in the penultimate over when he threw his bat at a wide delivery from Coulter-Nile but picked the man patrolling the boundary; he made 42 from 41 balls. Patel contributed 22 from 26 balls to the 57-run seventh wicket stand before he holed out to long on. KXIP eventually batted out their twenty overs, but only had 118 runs on the board.

For DD, the tone for the innings was set by the returning Zaheer Khan, after which Nathan Coulter-Nile stamped his authority, returning with career-best figures of 4 for 20. Duminy (4-0-15-1) and Amit Mishra (2-0-10-1) were the other wicket-takers. DD’s top wicket-taker in the season – Imran Tahir, couldn’t add to his tally of 13 wickets, and conceded 36 runs in his three overs.

Given the meagre target in front of them, the run-chase was always going to be a formality. And so it turned out to be. Mayank Agarwal and Shreyas Iyer (who picked up 19 runs off the second over of the innings bowled by debutant Shardul Thakur) completed the job in hand without fairly easily; the opening pair added 106 runs in 12.3 overs before Shreyas (54 from 40 balls) picked out the man at midwicket. Mayank brought up his half-century in the thirteenth over when he cut away a Shardul Thakur delivery through cover point and remained unbeaten on 52 from 40 balls. The winning runs came by means of a wide delivery, bowled by Axar Patel in the fourteenth over.

The Delhi Daredevils also used this match to lend their support to cancer awareness. All the Delhi Daredevils players and support staff sported lavender-colour jerseys on the day as a part of the initiative.

Brief Scores

Kings XI Punjab 118-8 in 20.0 Overs (David Miller 42, Nathan Coulter-Nile 4-20) lost to Delhi Daredevils 119-1 in 13.5 Overs (Shreyas Iyer 54, Mayank Agarwal 52*)

Man of the Match: Nathan Coulter-Nile, for his 4-20.