INDIAN PREMIER LEAGUE - CHENNAI WON BY 7 RUNS ON RAJASTHAN ROYALS

INDIAN PREMIER LEAGUE 7- RAJASTHAN MISSING DRAVID
R.JADEJA STEERS CHENNAI TO A CERTAIN VICTORY OVER ROYALS.

Steven Smith miscued an uppish drive off Ravindra Jadeja to long off but the fielder Mohit Sharma failed to latch on to a sharp chance, giving a life to the batsman. Next ball, Smith came down the track and hammered a friendly full toss wide to the left of the long-off fieldsman for four. Two balls and two singles later, Smith, unsatisfied with seven runs in the over already, repeats the uppish drive but this time isn't lucky enough. A sharper fielder in Faf du Plessis at long-off takes the catch and Smith becomes the fifth of the top-six Rajasthan Royals' batsmen to throw away his wicket. By that time, Royals had pressed the self-inflict button enough times to shoot themselves on the foot as they stumbled to their second loss in the seventh edition of the Indian Premier League against Chennai Super Kings at Dubai on Wednesday, April 23, 2014. What was most disturbing sight for me was the look on Dravid's face when Smith got out in Royal's chase. Dravid had a mixture of disappointment, disgust, shock, awe and frustration on his face as he saw a specialist batsmen fritter away a good start only to gift away his wicket, quite unlike the characteristic displayed by RR mentor Dravid during his playing days. Perhaps Dravid thought to himself, 'I wish I was batting out there, I could have fought hard enough to at least bat till the end and give my team a chance', chasing a modest total on a tricky Dubai International Cricket Stadium pitch. Under Dravid's captaincy, the Royals, being the perennial underdogs, did show the stomach to fight with whatever resources they had at their disposal. In the first week of IPL 7, Royals missed a Dravid-like batting approach in their bid to chase Chennai's 140/6. Post Dravid's playing era, the biggest problem that RR has had to deal with is who'll replace The Wall at the top? Especially, when Dravid and Ajinkya Rahane forged one of the most consistent opening partnerships in the last couple of seasons. To my astonishment, to partner Rahane, they chose Abhishek Nayar, someone who has hardly opened the batting in domestic circuit. What was the thinking behind the move? Shouldn't Shane Watson himself lead from the front and take the oppositions head on. That would have been a decisive move and an in form Watson would have been harder to bowl to first up for any opening opposition bowler. Perhaps, Watson was not himself confident of going out to open, coming into the tournament with a string of poor form and hardly anything to show forth in his batting form this year in international cricket. Dravid would have been livid with his batsmen on Wednesday as they none of them showed urgency to buckle down and build an innings by settling into a rhythm of collecting ones and twos and hit the occasional boundary, after all the required run-rate wasn't sky high at an achievable seven-an-over at the start of the innings. Seeing the batting effort of RR on Wednesday, commentators were heard harping upon the importance of staying out there in the middle. "Sometimes I think in a T20 game, there is a case of a sheet anchor, who can hold one end up," said former Pakistan captain and commentator Rameez Raza. Alan Wilkins' response to that, "That's what Cheteshwar Pujara has done for Kings XI Punjab, who've been so successful" On tracks which have inconsistence bounce, where the ball is not coming on to the bat ideally, there arises a need of sheet anchor in the Dravid or Pujara mould. One of the reasons why Royals were so competitive last season and even during Champions League T20, where they reached the finals, was that even after Dravid was out early, there was a Rahane or a Sanju Samson, who would hold one end up and try and bat till the end and let the strokeplayers like Watson, Stuart Binny and Brad Hodge do the big hitting from the other end. Against CSK, Rahane, Samson, Watson, Binny and even Smith went against the script and none of them looked to bat through the innings. Royals would do well to reconsider their batting order or restructure their batting strategy if they are to remain competitive in this merciless format. Give an attacking opener in Unmukt Chand a go. Surely, Dravid's glue is far from them at the moment.
Joshua Nath,

SCORECARD

Chennai Super Kings 140 for 6 (Dwayne Smith 50, Jadeja 36*, Bhatia 2-13) beat Rajasthan Royals 133 (Jadeja 4-33) by seven runs