HYDERABAD (TIP): Rajasthan Royals have conjured some of the better moments of the IPL this term. After the only Super Over so far in the tournament, which involved RR when they edged out Kolkata Knight Riders in Abu Dhabi, Pravin Tambe produced a twoball hat-trick against the same team on Monday in their reverse fixture at Ahmedabad.
On Thursday, Shane Watson’s hat-trick was cheese as compared to Tambe’s chalk, as the RR captain nipped out Sunrisers Hyderabad’s Shikhar Dhawan [33], Moises Henriques [9] and Karn Sharma [0] off successive deliveries spread over 13 overs. Watson hit bowling form against KKR and Tambe’s hat-trick was partly due to the Australian’s triple-blow in an over that made the inroads.
At the Sardar Patel Stadium, with a healthy cover of grass on the surface, the SRH batsmen got off to a blistering start, but Watson struck with the last ball of his first over, the fourth of the innings, to check their progress. Dhawan had looked dangerous, striking the ball cleanly square of the wicket until a Watson delivery skidded off the surface and grazed the offstump.
Rajat Bhatia’s crafty medium-pace accounted for Aaron Finch [9], Lokesh Rahul [18] and Naman Ojha [17], his 3 for 23 having already taken the sting out of the SRH innings. Watson just had to mop up, and his double-wicket strike in his second spell – the 17th over – ended all hopes of a late SRH fightback as they could only muster 134 for 9.
Henriques, who replaced Darren Sammy in the SRH XI couldn’t get going, holing out to Ajinkya Rahane at long-off before Karn Sharma, the new man in, couldn’t resist the wide slower ball follow-up that Watson sent down, only managing a faint tickle onto the wicketkeeper Sanju Samson. Watson didn’t seem to have realized that he had collected a hat-trick, but Rajasthan Royals gave themselves a fabulous chance of surging higher in the points table.