Rajasthan Royals captain Sanju Samson did well for his chances ahead of the T20 World Cup squad, scoring an unbeaten 71 off 33 balls and overshadowing a similar effort from Lucknow Super Giants captain KL Rahul (76 off 48 balls). Rajasthan Royals, one of the in-form teams in this IPL, claimed a seven-wicket victory on Saturday with Samson leading his troops from the front. The battle for wicketkeepers in the T20 squad for the 2024 World Cup remains one of the most intense, and Samson has proven why he deserves to be number 1 in that pecking order.
Samson, who scored his fourth half-century of IPL 2024 off 28 balls, shared an unbeaten 121-run partnership with Dhruv Jurel, who scored his first IPL half-century as Rajasthan Royals cruised to 199/3 in 19 overs in reply to Lucknow O Super Giants’ 196/5 was made possible by Rahul’s excellent innings and his 115-run partnership with Deepak Hooda (50).
Samson, who had scores of 82*, 69, 68* before Saturday’s excellent knock, hit seven boundaries and four sixes in another brilliant innings to help Rajasthan Royals recover for two quick wickets and with the help of Jurel, who scored 52 not out from 34 balls, raised 121 runs for the fourth wicket partnership to guide RR to a comfortable victory at the Bharat Ratna Shri Atal Bihari Vajpayee Ekana Cricket Stadium.
With this victory, table-toppers Rajasthan Royals moved to 16 points from eight wins in nine matches, opening a huge six-point gap at the top of the table. LSG remained in fourth place with 10 points, the same as Kolkata Knight Riders (2nd), Sunrisers Hyderabad (3rd) and Delhi Capitals (5th). They played nine matches while KKR and SRH played eight matches each. DC has finished with 10 games so far.
Best Sanju Samson celebration ever. pic.twitter.com/AfHH2PI68u
-Rajasthan Royals (@rajasthanroyals) April 27, 2024
After the game, Samson said at the post-match presentation ceremony: “I’m very lucky to be behind the wickets. There was some buying with the new ball and so it was a good wicket to bat on. The guys who came in and bowled an over at power -play did an important job. There was a lot of planning behind the scenes. The start and end of the innings were good.
“We lost a few in the middle of the over. Form is temporary in this format. We saw Jurel in the Tests. We believe in him. He is batting for an hour and two hours sometimes in the nets. We have done really well. We have also had a bit of luck. We need to maintain the right process. In team meetings, we talk about marking processes one game at a time.
With IANS inputs
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