Rajasthan Royals (RR) won their first game of the season after beating the Delhi Capitals (DC) in Match 7 of the VIVO Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021 at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on Thursday.

A fifty from David Miller and a terrific cameo from Chris Morris at the end sealed the victory for the RR in yet another low-scoring thriller.

Chasing 148 to win, Manan Vohra and Jos Buttler opened the innings for RR. While Vohra hit two consecutive boundaries off Chris Woakes after a couple of quiet overs at the start, the right-arm pacer dismissed the RR openers in the same over, guiding DC to the start they wanted. 

First, Vohra, who tried to go aerial, was holed out to Rabada at long-on before Pant took a terrific catch to get Buttler out.

The Royals were in all sorts of trouble after skipper Sanju Samson edged it straight to Dhawan at slips after getting beaten with Rabada’s pace as RR finished their powerplay at 26-3.

Shivam Dube was the next man to get out as Avesh Khan got the better of Dube, with his pace that produced a thick-edge straight to the fly-slip. 

The pacer then varied his pace, deceiving Riyan Parag, who got the height but not the distance as Dhawan completed his third catch of the innings. 

The Royals were 52-5 at the halfway mark. After a couple of quiet overs, Miller welcomed Marcus Stoinis into the attack with three boundaries in a row that sounded beautifully off the bat.

Tewatia, who had joined Miller in the middle after Riyan Parag’s fall, complimented Miller, scoring a couple of fours off Tom Curran in the 14th over, forming a vital partnership for the sixth wicket.

DC skipper Pant handed the ball to Rabada in the 15th over and the seamer provided the breakthrough, dismissing Tewatia with pace and bounce.

Miller then brought up his fifty and was going strong, carrying the hopes for the RR, who required 58 off the final five overs to secure a win.

In the 16th over, Miller clobbered two consecutive sixes against Avesh Khan and was right in the zone before Avesh got him out on the fifth delivery after the left-hander attempted to complete a hat-trick of sixes.

It was a tough equation that was out of reach for RR at the end after losing 7 wickets, with Morris and Unadkat at the crease.

With seven wickets down and 43 runs to get in the last four overs, RR were on the backfoot and the pressure mounted further as they could only score 16 runs over the course of the 17th and the 18th over.

RR required 27 off the last 2 over. The 19th over then swung the momentum in RR’s favour as Morris clubbed two sixes off Rabada to bring down the target to 12 runs off the final over.

DC opted to give Tom Curran the responsibility to defend those 12 runs. But Morris, as calm as ever, tonked two sixes off the England pacer, and got RR over the line.

Earlier, Sanju Samson won the toss and opted to bowl against DC. Chetan Sakariya, who made a fine debut in the previous game started off well against the DC openers – Prithvi Shaw and Shikhar Dhawan – giving away just 2 runs in the first over of the innings.

Jaydev Unadkat, on the other end, built severe pressure with dot balls and found a breakthrough as Shaw ran out of patience, edging the ball straight to backward point in the second over of the match. 

The left-arm pacer then got rid of Dhawan in the fourth over of the innings, courtesy a screamer from the RR wicketkeeper-batsman and skipper, Samson.

Pant smacked a few boundaries to get things going but the powerplay belonged to Jaydev Unadkat, who scalped his third wicket inside the six overs after dismissing Ajinkya Rahane, helping RR limit DC to 36/3 after 6 overs.

Mustafizur Rahman joined the wicket-taking party after deceiving Marcus Stoinis with a slow cutter, getting the DC all-rounder out for a duck. Lalit Yadav, who joined Pant, played a couple of confident strokes for fours in the eighth over.

DC were still striking below 6 at the end of ten overs, placed at 57-4, with Pant and Lalit in the middle.

The left-hander shifted gears and scored 20 runs off the 11th over bowled by Rahul Tewatia, smacking four fours. He brought up his half-century with a four, and helped DC recover from a difficult phase.

However, Pant ran himself out, thanks to an excellent direct hit from Riyan Parag off his own bowling as RR broke the important partnership between Pant and Lalit.

Yet another outstanding piece of fielding from the Royals contributed to a dismissal after Tewatia ran backwards and took a well-judged catch to dismiss Lalit.

With four overs to go, Curran and Woakes had the task of finishing  the DC innings on a higher note. The duo hit three boundaries and added 28 runs before Curran was castled by Mustafizur’s slower-cutter.  

R Ashwin got run out in the same over after trying to sneak in a double. DC scored 11 runs off the final over bowled by Sakariya and finished their innings with a total of 147/8.

Brief Scores:  Rajasthan Royals 150/7 (David Miller 62, Chris Morris 36*; Avesh Khan 3/32) beat Delhi Capitals 147/8 (Rishabh Pant 51, Tom Curran 21; Jaydev Unadkat 3/15) by 3 wickets.