Rajasthan Royals convincingly defeated Kolkata Knight Riders by nine wickets in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 on Thursday. RR’s opening batsman Yashasvi Jaiswal and skipper Sanju Samson were the chief architects of the victory. Jaiswal played an excellent knock, remaining unbeaten on 98 off 52 balls, while Samson contributed an unbeaten 67 off 38 deliveries. The duo’s unbeaten partnership of 121 runs was too much for KKR to handle.
Jaiswal played a superb innings, hitting 12 fours and four sixes. He had earlier become the fastest player to score a fifty in IPL history, reaching the milestone in just 14 balls. Although he couldn’t reach his second hundredth of the season, he played a crucial role in his team’s victory. Samson, on the other hand, smashed four fours and five sixes in his unbeaten innings.
One incident that caught the attention of fans was when Jaiswal was on 94 and Samson was facing the last ball of the 13th over. KKR’s spinner Suyash Sharma bowled a ball on the leg side, which looked like an attempt to bowl a wide ball and deny Jaiswal the opportunity to complete his century. However, Samson showed great presence of mind to block the delivery, preventing a wide while not scoring a run either.
Samson then suggested hitting a six on the first ball of the next over to let Jaiswal complete his hundred as RR needed only three runs to win. Unfortunately, Jaiswal could only hit a four, ending his innings at an unbeaten 98. After the match, Jaiswal said he didn’t have a hundred in mind, but just the will to increase the team’s net run rate.
Interestingly, Rajasthan Royals also took to Twitter to compare this moment with a Kohli-Dhoni incident from the 2014 T20 World Cup semi-final between India and South Africa. In that game, MS Dhoni had stopped a ball on the final delivery of an over in a bid to let Virat Kohli score the winning runs.
With this win, RR has climbed to the third spot in the points table. The team will be looking to continue their good form in their upcoming matches.
