Guwahati. Despite an inning of 48 runs by local player Riyan Parag, Rajasthan Royals batsmen could only score 144 runs for nine wickets against the accurate bowling of Punjab Kings on a slow pitch in their 13th match of the Indian Premier League (IPL) here on Wednesday.
Rajasthan Royals, who have faced defeat in the last three matches, have already qualified for the playoffs. For Rajasthan, which won the toss and came to bat, Parag hit six fours in his 34-ball innings, while Ravichandran Ashwin contributed 28 runs in 19 balls with three fours and one six. Both of them tried to speed up the innings by making a partnership of 50 runs for the fourth wicket but their efforts were not successful.
After losing the wicket of Yashasvi Jaiswal, the run rate of Rajasthan’s innings slowed down. Jaiswal’s innings was bowled out by Sam Curran (2 wickets for 24 runs). Sanju Samson (18 runs), who crossed the 500-run mark in a season for the first time in his IPL career, and Tom Kohler Cadmore (18 runs) added 36 runs for the second wicket. But both of them took six overs for this.
However, both of them also hit some attractive shots in between.
Karan and Arshdeep were getting swing and both maintained good line and length due to which it was not easy for Rajasthan batsmen to score runs. In the seventh over, Samson gave an easy catch to Rahul Chahar at point off the ball of fast bowler Nathan Ellis.
Cadmore also returned to the dugout in the next over. While trying to pick up and hit the ball of leg spinner Chahar (two wickets for 26 runs), he was caught by Jitesh Sharma in the deep.
After both of them were out, Ashwin and Parag batted with restraint. Ashwin demonstrated his batting skills and scored 17 runs by hitting a six and two fours in the 12th over. But he could not play a long innings and was out after being caught by Shashank Singh on the ball of Arshdeep. Seeing the continuous fall of wickets at the other end, Parag had to rein in his aggressive batting.
But Parag managed to cross the 500-run mark in this session by hitting a four over third man off Karan’s ball. He is the second uncapped player (who has not played international cricket) to do so in IPL. Yashasvi Jaiswal became the first player to score 625 runs in 2023.
Australia’s Shaun Marsh (616 runs) became the first uncapped player to score 500 runs in the opening round in 2008 as he was not selected in the national team. Rajasthan Royals batsmen failed to score runs and in the end the hope of adding runs quickly was broken by Harshal Patel by LBWing Parag.