272 too good for Delhi as Sunil Narine powers KKR to top of points table

Delhi Capitals were the hapless recipients of this spectacular mauling on a belter of a pitch at Visakhapatnam on Wednesday, guilty of dropping catches, bowling wide, high, all over the place really till it didn’t matter anymore. Defeat came in the form of a 106-run thrashing, but it could have been worse had Rishabh Pant and Tristan Stubbs hadn’t dug in their heels with resilient fifties.

It wasn’t enough of course, considering how KKR kept rolling out their big guns and each of them fired exactly the way they were meant to. Runs were scored at a phenomenal pace as Sunil Narine smashed 85 — his highest IPL score — off just 39 balls (7x4, 7x6); Angkrish Raghuvanshi piled 54 at a strike rate of 200 (27b, 5x4, 3x6), Andre Russell 41 off 19 balls and Rinku Singh nonchalantly smoked three sixes in an eight-ball 26.

Every ball was timed sweetly, every drive and punch found the gap with ease and every six stayed hit as KKR matched 18 fours with 18 sixes in an encore of the carnage Sunrisers Hyderabad had inflicted on Mumbai Indians barely a week back. KKR could have easily overtaken 277, but Ishant Sharma finally found his rhythm at the fag end of his spell, comprehensively yorking Russell before dismissing Ramandeep Singh in an eight-run over.