Lucknow Super Giants defeated Delhi Capitals by 50 runs in match 3 of Tata IPL 2023 at Lucknow on Saturday. Kyle Mayers and Mark Wood shine on their LSG debut.
Delhi Capitals won the toss and elected to bowl first. Lucknow was off to a slow start as KL Rahul & Kyle Mayers struggled to adjust to the conditions early in the innings. Lucknow skipper KL Rahul’s poor run of form continues. Rahul scored 8 runs in 12 balls before holding out to Axar Patel at square leg.
West Indian all-rounder Kyle Mayers announced his arrival to IPL cricket in style. Mayers smashed Delhi Capitals bowlers to all parts of the ground. He was dropped on 14 by Khaleel Ahemd which proved to be a costly miss for Delhi.
Mayers took the attack to DC bowlers and dealt in boundaries. Mayers scored 28 balls fifty smashing Axar Patel and Kuldeep Yadav.
Deepak Hooda solidified the innings at the other end. The pair added 79 runs in 7 overs. Both batters were well set, looking dangerous. Kuldeep Yadav dismissed Deepak Hodda for 17 runs and in the next over Axar Patel bowled a slowish delivery that spun sharply cleaning up Mayers. LSG was 102/3 at the end of 12 overs. Stoinis couldn’t make an impact and LSG lost three wickets in the space of 20 runs.
Nicholas Pooran batting at no 6 started his onslaught smashing 36 runs in 21 balls. Abhinav Manohar’s blitz cameo in the final overpowered Lucknow SuperGiants to 193/6 in 20 overs.
Mark Wood Blows out Delhi Capitals
Delhi Capitals were off to a great start Smashing 41 runs in 4 overs. Mark Wood making his comeback after 6 years since his IPL debut dismantled Delhi batters with his RAW pace and swing.
Prithvi Shaw’s off stump was rattled by Mark Wood. On the very next ball, Mitchell Marsh was cleaned up by a peach of a bowl from Wood. Wood bowled a fast inswinging full-length bowl disturbing the middle stump. Wood then dismissed Sarfraz Khan in his 2nd over of the match with a sharp bouncer as Sarfraz edged one to fine leg.
Delhi failed to catch up to the required run rate and lost wickets at regular intervals. Ravi Bishnoi did the damage in the middle overs dismissing Rilee Rossouw and Rovman Powell.
David Warner fought hard scoring his 56th fifty in his IPL career. Warner failed to kick on after his half-century. Mark Wood in his 2nd spell picked up two wickets in one over and picked up his first five-fer in IPL.
Delhi Capitals hand Lucknow SuperGiants an easy win by 50 runs. The capitals lost their three straight games against Lucknow in IPL. Mark Wood was awarded Player of the match award for his match-winning bowling spell of 5/14 in 4 overs.
Takeaways from the game
Delhi Capitals – The Capitals got a strong batting lineup but struggled to score against wrist spinners. Mukesh Kumar was the stand-out performer for Delhi in a high-scoring game. David Warner’s return to form is a huge positive for the Capitals.
Lucknow Super Giants – Kyle Mayers is a perfect ally to KL Rahul. Mayers power-hitting combined with KL Rahul’s calmness is a perfect combination for LSG. The bowling form of Mark Wood as a lead bowler further bolsters the bowling attack of Lucknow.
Post-Match Interview (Source: Cricbuzz)
KL Rahul: It was a great start. We were clueless about the pitch, nice way to start. We’ll take confidence from this win. Toss is not in our hands, with the new rules you get to play with the team you want. Gives great depth in bowling and batting.
David Warner: It was a bit of a challenge. We had some early momentum with the fast bowlers, they bowled very well in the powerplay. A few dropped catches and the momentum shifted there but you can’t take anything away from Lucknow.
