Cricket - Superb bowling from Dale Steyn and Darryn Sammy led the Sunrisers Hyderabad to the easiest of victories, beating the Kings XI Punjab by 30 runs in Chandigarh on Saturday.
According to SuperSport's website, Steyn struck with his fifth ball on his way to another excellent analysis of 2-20, while Sammy had an even batter start, snapping up wickets with his first two deliveries to finish on 4-22 while performing his extravagant celebrations.
After Mandeep Singh's early departure, Adam Gilchrist and Shaun Marsh took the score to 45, but Punjab were always behind the required rate. Sammy's dramatic introduction to the attack, going on to take three wickets in his first ten balls, saw the home team in a heap of trouble at 51 for four.
Luke Pomersbach battled to keep the scoreboard moving, only getting off the mark from the eighth ball he faced, but Rajagopal Sathish helped push things along as they added 51 for the fifth wicket. Eighteen runs came off the 14th over. Even this left the required rate in double figures only for Steyn to return to the attack with a four-run over to re-apply the brakes.
Pomersbach finished on a laboured unbeaten 33 off 40 balls as Punjab fell well short of their target of 151.
Man-of-the-Match Parthiv Patel held things together for the Sunrisers after they were asked to bat first. His 61 was pedestrian at times, and he was dropped with just two runs to his name. There was some acceleration from Thisara Perera with an aggressive 32 off 18 balls, including two fours and two sixes.
Young paceman Sandeep Sharma impressed on his IPL debut, taking 3-21 in a promising spell while Piyush Chawla displayed a number of variations to his leg-spinners in a respectable return of 1-20.
Hyderabad remain outside the playoff positions in fifth place, level on points with the Royal Challengers Bangalore but well behind on net run rate.
As for Punjab, their only hope of qualifying now rests both on winning their final three matches and a weird combination of results among the higher placed teams.
KINGS XI PUNJAB: AC Gilchrist (capt & wk), Mandeep Singh, SE Marsh, LA Pomersbach, DA Miller, R Sathish, PP Chawla, P Kumar, Harmeet Singh, P Awana, Sandeep Sharma
SUNRISERS HYDERABAD: PA Patel (wk), S Dhawan, GH Vihari, CL White (capt), NLTC Perera, DJG Sammy, BB Samantray, KV Sharma, A Mishra, DW Steyn, I Sharma
According to SuperSport's website, Steyn struck with his fifth ball on his way to another excellent analysis of 2-20, while Sammy had an even batter start, snapping up wickets with his first two deliveries to finish on 4-22 while performing his extravagant celebrations.
After Mandeep Singh's early departure, Adam Gilchrist and Shaun Marsh took the score to 45, but Punjab were always behind the required rate. Sammy's dramatic introduction to the attack, going on to take three wickets in his first ten balls, saw the home team in a heap of trouble at 51 for four.
Luke Pomersbach battled to keep the scoreboard moving, only getting off the mark from the eighth ball he faced, but Rajagopal Sathish helped push things along as they added 51 for the fifth wicket. Eighteen runs came off the 14th over. Even this left the required rate in double figures only for Steyn to return to the attack with a four-run over to re-apply the brakes.
Pomersbach finished on a laboured unbeaten 33 off 40 balls as Punjab fell well short of their target of 151.
Man-of-the-Match Parthiv Patel held things together for the Sunrisers after they were asked to bat first. His 61 was pedestrian at times, and he was dropped with just two runs to his name. There was some acceleration from Thisara Perera with an aggressive 32 off 18 balls, including two fours and two sixes.
Young paceman Sandeep Sharma impressed on his IPL debut, taking 3-21 in a promising spell while Piyush Chawla displayed a number of variations to his leg-spinners in a respectable return of 1-20.
Hyderabad remain outside the playoff positions in fifth place, level on points with the Royal Challengers Bangalore but well behind on net run rate.
As for Punjab, their only hope of qualifying now rests both on winning their final three matches and a weird combination of results among the higher placed teams.
KINGS XI PUNJAB: AC Gilchrist (capt & wk), Mandeep Singh, SE Marsh, LA Pomersbach, DA Miller, R Sathish, PP Chawla, P Kumar, Harmeet Singh, P Awana, Sandeep Sharma
SUNRISERS HYDERABAD: PA Patel (wk), S Dhawan, GH Vihari, CL White (capt), NLTC Perera, DJG Sammy, BB Samantray, KV Sharma, A Mishra, DW Steyn, I Sharma