The match played on 5th April 2010 at Vidarbha Cricket Association, Nagpur between Deccan Chargers and Rajasthan Roayals must rank as one of the most exciting matches in Indian Premier League.

Deccan Chargers were well on course towards a easy win before Shane Warne, the king of mental battles triggered a collapse.  If one were to view the match from a neutral angle it was one of the best matches ever in terms of the excitement which was generated and if one were to one of those Shane Warne fans among millions of them, then one must admit that Shane Warne even at the age of 40 years and 205 days still is the master of a cricket ground, much in the same vein he was in his playing days in a exemplary career. However if one were to view from Deccan Chargers angle, one must admitthat their batsmen threw away the match not once but many times during the course of their innings and that is something which cannot be forgiven. For a batsmen or batting team in most cases, the first mistake is invariably the last mistake but in the case of Deccan Charges they got umpteen number of chances to redeem themselves and every time they threw it away.

To begin with Deccan Chargers had the luxury of starting the chase with almost zero pressure as 160 was not a demanding target by any stretch of imagination atleast in IPL3 and if you consider the fact that Rajasthan Royals almost chased 246 against Chennai and Kings Eleven Punjab successfully chased 200 in earlier league matches, their confidence should have been sky high.  Gilchrist had the opposition and bowler Dole at his feet having blitzed 34 of 16 deliveries and 17 in the over and the situation was conducive for him to play a long innings without the pressure of a mounting run rate,  but he decided to throw away his wicket thereby putting his team in some sort of trouble since Deccan Chargers seem to be over reliant on him.  However to be fair to Gilchrist, the shot was on to the delivery he got out but Symonds dismissal is something which is inexcusable.  Symondswas not middling the bowl well but with required rate well under 8 per over, Symonds had a golden opportunity to play himself in especially with Rohit Sharma middling the ball well.  However Symonds decided to throw his wicket when Deccan Chargers was coasting towards the target.

Rohit Sharma was still stroking the ball well after Symonds dismissal and what was required for the rest of the batsmen was to just stay at the wicket and what they did was exactly the opposite.  It was tragic seeing Rohit Sharma run out of partners much in the same way Sachin used to run out of partners early in his career.  Rohit Sharma's brilliant innings especially under pressure late in the innings, deserved a win but so too did Shane Warnes magical spell.  Rohit Sharma can be faulted only for mistake and that was getting himself off strike in the last over when a mere 6 runs were required of 6 deliveries.  There was no need for Rohit Sharma to get  off strike in the last over as 6 runs is nothing but one or two good hits to the boundary to seal of the match for any decent batsmen and Rohit is too good a batsman at putting away two deliveries in a over for boundaries.  Rohit usually very intelligenet relied on the tail enders which proved to be a big blunder in the end and that cost the match for Deccan Chargers. 

• Written by N R SATISH.
• In category Cricket.
• 14 years ago.

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