Axar Patel and Shikhar Dhawan IPL century: The left-handed duo from Delhi Capitals stitched a 26-run stand to seal the chase.
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During the 34th match of the ongoing 13th season of the Indian Premier League between Delhi Capitals and Chennai Super Kings in Sharjah, Delhi Capitals beat Chennai Super Kings by 5 wickets to register their seventh victory this season.
Chasing a 180-run target, Capitals lost Prithvi Shaw (0) and Ajinkya Rahane (8) inside the powerplay to register a below par start. However, it was a 68-run partnership for the third wicket between opening batsman Shikhar Dhawan and captain Shreyas Iyer which put Delhi back on track.
Dhawan, who had scored a 16-ball 24 in the powerplay, maintained his form with Iyer playing second fiddle to him. Having struck some eye-catching boundaries, the 34-year old player scored runs across the ground.
It was on the third delivery of the 10th over that Dhawan ran a single off Chennai all-rounder Dwayne Bravo to complete his third consecutive half-century.
With Delhi needing 104 runs in the last 10 overs, Dhawan found boundaries willfully despite losing Iyer (23). The situation eventually demanded Capitals to score 51 runs in the last five overs. In the 17th over, Dhawan hit a four and a six off Chennai all-rounder Sam Curran to bring down the equation to needing 30 runs in three overs.
Curran giving away just four runs in the penultimate over meant that DC had to score 17 runs in the last over being bowled by Ravindra Jadeja. However, Capitals all-rounder Axar Patel hit three sixes off Jadeja to seal an emphatic chase.
While Patel’s 5-ball 21 won the match for DC, it was Dhawan who worked the hardest to score his maiden IPL century, 101* (58), with the help of 14 fours and a six.
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Earlier, Super Kings scored 179/4 in 20 overs after captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni won the toss and chose to bat. Having scored 58 (47) including six fours and two sixes, opening batsman Faf du Plessis was CSK’s top run-scorer. For DC, pacer Anrich Nortje was the pick of their bowlers with figures of 4-0-44-2.
