Rajasthan Royals were lying at the bottom of the eight-team points table. After the win against CSK, they are in the race to qualify for the playoffs.
Rajasthan Royals players. (Photo: Twitter/@IPL)
Former champions Rajasthan Royals kept their hopes alive of making it into the knockout stages of the current season of the Indian Premier League (IPL) after a comprehensive 7-wicket win over Chennai Super Kings (CSK) on Monday.
Before the match, Rajasthan were lying at the bottom of the eight-team points table. However, after they won with 2.3 overs to spare at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi, the Royals have climbed to the fifth spot with eight points from 10 matches.
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Jos Buttler with his unbeaten knock of 70 runs off 48 balls was the star for Steve Smith’s team, despite coming to bat at fifth. The skipper himself remained not out at 26 after his bowlers had bundled CSK out for a paltry total of 125/5.
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Languishing at the bottom of the points table, Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s men will now have to win all their remaining matches and hope for some permutation combinations in their favour.
Earlier, CSK won the toss and batted in a match that was captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni’s 200th in the IPL; he thus became the first player to play 200 IPL matches.
Jofra Archer bowled a miserly spell of four overs, picking up the wicket of in-form Faf du Plessis and conceding just 20 runs.
Ravindra Jadeja top scored with 35 not out (off 30 balls) while Dhoni made 28 off 28 before being run out due to his own fault.
Jadeja and Dhoni added 53 runs in 7.4 overs as they struggled to get going. The two had joined hands at the fall of Ambati Rayudu’s wicket. CSK were struggling at 56/4 in 10 overs at the time.
Spinners Shreyas Gopal and Rahul Tewatia conceded just 32 runs in eight overs combined, picking up a wicket each.
Brief scores: CSK: 125/5 wkts in 20 overs (R Jadeja 35 not out, MS Dhoni 28, S Curran 22, S Gopal 1/14, R Tewatia 1/18, J Archer 1/20) lost to RR: 126/3 in 17.3 overs (J Buttler 70 not out, S Smith 26 not out, D Chahar 2/18) by seven wickets
With IANS inputs
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