Living by the sword

Through the Indian Premier League, Delhi’s batting has been driven by their top three.

The two Delhi openers started off by throwing caution to the wind, and got away with it. Sehwag had opened his account with a thick-edged drive to third-man for six and Gambhir joined in with some slashes of his own. There was a distinct lack of authority in their early batting, but with every nick, Mohali bled. The Daredevils were living by the sword, Kings XI Punjab were dying by it.

After the unsettling start, Sehwag realised his bat did have a middle after all. He got his front-foot out of the way and spanked VRV Singh over covers for a flat six. VRV, fast bowler that he is, banged the next one in short. Sehwag flayed that over the point boundary.

Gambhir motored along at the other end — overshadowed, but not outscored. He had rattled off 40 runs (28b, 7x4, 1x6) before being bowled by a Ramesh Powar arm-ball.

A brief shower had delayed the start of the match by 20 minutes, and with the Daredevils coasting at 86 for one after 8.1 overs, the skies opened up.

The match was reduced to 11 overs a side after a two-hour delay, and the contest to a lottery.

Delhi Daredevils

G Gambhir b Powar (28b 7x4 1x6) 40

V Sehwag not out (26b 2x4 5x6) 51

S Dhawan c Chawla b Powar (5b 1x6) 8

... contd.