Marsh, Thakur, spin duo lift Capitals to fourth spot
Kuldeep, Axar share four wickets; Punjab Kings need a miracle to make the playoffs
Kuldeep, Axar share four wickets; Punjab Kings need a miracle to make the playoffs
Scorer: M Venkat Raghav | Commentator: @PeterDellaPenna
11.20 pm So Delhi Capitals move up to 14 points and are ahead of RCB on net run rate so are officially in fourth place and control their own destiny for a playoff berth if they win their final league phase match. Punjab Kings on the other hand stay on 12 points and will need a win in their final match plus a hell of a lot of help from other results over the final week to sneak into the playoffs.
Punjab captain Mayank Agarwal: "We didn't bat well. Between overs 5 and 10, we lost too many wickets and that's where we lost the game. I thought it was definitely chaseable for the batting we have and the wicket wasn't as bad as it seemed. We just lost too many wickets between the 5th and 10th over and lost the game there. [Hope for final match] It's still a match to be played and a match to be won. Two points are crucial for us. We want to go out there and play the best cricket. I think we haven't yet played our best cricket yet and we look forward to doing that in the last game. We need to speak about the way we went about things with the bat, but that's about it. It's a game to forget."
Delhi allrounder Mitchell Marsh: "It was a great win. You can never judge a wicket until both teams bat on it. I walked off sort of thinking that we left a couple out there. But it turned didn't it. The spinners turned the game in the middle and 160 wound up being enough. [Batting mindset] Get as many as I can in the Powerplay before it starts turning. For the last sort of 18 months, I've had that mentality in the Powerplay. I thought it was a really good partnership with Sarfaraz. He played some amazing shots. It would've been nice to get out of the Powerplay one down and then we probably could have kept going. But our innings was sort of stop start with wickets. Credit goes to the bowlers. The way they bowled was outstanding. [On his batting approach when wickets fall at the other end] It's just about getting a partnership going. We probably weren't able to quite do that throughout our middle overs tonight and that doesn't allow you to get up to a 180 score. It's just about whoever comes in, trying to build that partnership. Even if it's 15 or 20 runs, it can change momentum. Tonight we weren't able to do that, but like I said, 160 wound up being enough. I think that's our first back-to-back win of the season. We spoke about that today. It's been one of those seasons where we've been stop start. In long tournaments like this, it's about peaking at the right time. I think over the last week or 10 days, we've played some really good cricket and that's a really good sign. We've got one more to go. We know if we win that, we'll be in the finals and we can give it a real good shake. I've got great belief in this team. We've got a lot of talent across the board and if we can string one more together going into the finals, it'll give us great momentum."
Delhi Capitals captain Rishabh Pant: "Playing throughout the tournament we have been losing one game and winning one game. That's something we wanted to change as a team and we got it. [Asked about not bowling Kuldeep's fourth over] We saved him for the back half and then the dew seeps in. So we didn't want to give a massive over. It was 50/50. [Thought process on batting approach] The only thought process was to take it deep. We saw the spinners bowling well in the wicket. The wicket was slow. [Approach for the final game] Mostly it's going to be the same but we have to assess the wicket. We don't know how it will play in Wankhede. [Prithvi Shaw's fitness status] I think he's 50/50. We'll know in a few days time."
Shardul Thakur named Player of the Match for his four-wicket haul: "It was good. I always like to perform in the crunch times. These last two games, 13 and 14 games, are important for our team. I always feel happy when I rise to the occasion for our team. I think the sixth over was the big over where I got two wickets. They were cruising and we saw in both innings, the Powerplay was a big one. Fast bowlers were going for runs. And as soon as the Powerplay ended, suddenly the runs stopped. So getting two wickets in the sixth over was very crucial and after that the spinners came on for us and did the job pretty well. [Bowling early vs at the death] It was very different. I think in the first half as a bowling unit we were trying to hit good areas so that something happens off the pitch. The ball was also fairly new and the seam up. But after 12 overs, suddenly there was a lot of dew and probably that's why we did not bowl the fourth over from Kuldeep Yadav. It was tough. It's not easy bowling in the dewy conditions. Probably what worked for us was that we took a lot of wickets in the first 10-12 overs and in the end Punjab did not have enough wickets [left]."
That's it from today's live coverage on ESPNcricinfo. Come back tomorrow for more live action. On behalf of my commentary partner Sidharth Monga, I'm Peter Della Penna. Take care!
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Kuldeep, Axar share four wickets; Punjab Kings need a miracle to make the playoffs
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