Deccan Chargers captain, Adam Gilchrist, was not kidding when he said all it took for a team to fall was a small crack in the team spirit or performance. One look at the Chargers’ batting scorecard against the Rajasthan Royals will tell anyone the story.
For a second match in a row, the Deccan Chargers left the spectators flabbergasted. Expected to take the match from a reasonable position, it was once again their batting that baffled the minds. If Herschelle Gibbs and Andrew Symonds failed to launch in the last match, apart from Symonds and Gilchrist, every other batsman faced more balls than they had scored runs. And it explains why lost a Twenty20 match.
While some part of the credit should go to the Rajasthan Royals captain, Shane Warne, for keeping himself for later in the match and tightening the screws and picking up four wickets in the process, the Chargers did not help themselves when they played out rather sedately with none practically to help out singlehanded efforts of Rohit Sharma once Gilchrist departed for thirty-four runs.
The Royals, still tense about defending 159 runs in Nagpur, played the waiting game and it paid off as Rohit Sharma was forced to play a lone hand, making seventy-three runs all in vain. And the strangulation was complete with Siddharth Trivedi chipping in with three wickets as well.
And the margin of defeat? Two runs!
The Chargers would have fancied their chances despite the fact that Shane Watson once again made a notable contribution of fifty-eight runs while Faiz Fazal contributed thirty-six runs to the Royals tally.
But the Chargers snapped back to quickly send the Royals on a trip to the down road as R.P. Singh took three wickets for the count, while Harmeet Singh and Ryan Harris showed two of their own to leave the Royals feeling underpar when their innings came to a halt.
The Chargers are self destructing and unless Gilchrist can find the weak link, they are in line for an ignominious collapse.
2010 IPL 3 Match 35: Collingwood Shines Brighter for Daredevils In Battle Royale
Follow the action trail for all of the IPL 3 season:
2010 IPL 3 Schedule of Matches, IPL3 Points Tally, IPL 3 Team Squads, News in the Run Up
2010 IPL 3 Match 34: Mahela Helps KXIP Register their Second IPL 3 Win, Overpowering Gayle
