|| Indian Correspondent ||

The 19th match of 2020 edition of Indian Premier League (IPL) took place between Delhi Capitals and Royal Challengers Bangalore at Dubai International Stadium where youngster Prithvi Shaw and all-rounder Marcus Stoinis steer Delhi to a comfortable win.

Royal Challengers Bangalore won the toss and opted to field first. Put into bat, Shaw and Shikhar Dhawan got off to a flying start where Shaw took on Udana from the very first over with three boundaries. While Dhawan happily played as second fiddle, Shaw smashed a four through the covers and a six over long-on in Yuzvendra Chahal’s first over.

With these big hits, they managed to put up 63 inside the powerplay. However, Shaw’s stunning show of 42 off 23 with 5 fours and 2 sixes came to an end when Mohammed Siraj provided with the first breakthrough in the 7th over.

His dismissal brought Shreyas Iyer in the middle who started with a boundary through backward square leg. However, Washington Sundar and Siraj put on check in their free-flowing scoring as both Dhawan (32) and Iyer (11) got out inside 2 overs and Delhi posted 94 runs after 12 overs.

A huge task fell upon Marcus Stoinis and Rishabh Pant to put up a competitive total against a strong batting side like Bangalore. Both the batsmen slowly tried to steady the ship. Stoinis soon changed the gear with a six over deep mid-wicket and a boundary straight down the ground off Moeen Ali in the 14th over. Next over also witnessed a maximum and two fours from him only, However, Pant too joined the party with a six and a four off Navdeep Saini in the 17th over before fell for 37 in the penultimate over.

Stoinis brought his fifty with a four off Siraj. He top-scored with 53* off 26 with 6 fours and 2 sixes and Delhi ended up posting a massive total of 196 in their allotted 20 overs.

While chasing, Bangalore failed to get off to a steady start as their in-form opener Devdutt Padikkal couldn’t contribute much. He tried to swing his bat in a rather slow ball off Ashwin and found Stoinis at the deep mid-wicket who did no mistake. Captain Virat Kohli came in the middle and welcomed Axar Patel with a boundary through covers.

However, Patel had the last laugh as he removed Aaron Finch in the final ball of the over. Finch got a couple of life before in the game but that didn’t cost much as he got an outside edge and Pant took a stunner to send him in for 13.

While the pressure fell upon Kohli and AB de Villers, the latter couldn’t support his skipper as the in-form batsman mistimed a length ball off Anrich Nortje and hit towards mid-wicket where Dhawan took an easy catch. With his dismissal, Bangalore lost three key players inside the power play for 43 runs.