Pace bowlers Jofra Archer and Nandre Burger shared five wickets between them as Rajasthan Royals defended a modest total of 159 to beat Lucknow Super Giants by 40 runs in the IPL on Wednesday.
Burger, a left-handed quick from South Africa, struck two key blows including Mitchell Marsh for 55, and Archer took 3-20 to bundle out hosts Lucknow for 119 at the Ekana Stadium.
Rajasthan bounced back from successive defeats to jump to second in the table led by Punjab Kings.
Lucknow faltered in the chase after losing three early wickets, with skipper Rishabh Pant and Aiden Markram both out for a duck.
Burger had Pant caught behind in his first over before Markram miscued from Archer and skied a catch to wicketkeeper Dhruv Jurel.
Australia’s Marsh attempted to rescue Punjab with Nicholas Pooran (22) and then impact substitute Himmat Singh, who scored 15.
Marsh reached his fifty with a six off Burger but the bowler got his revenge two balls later when the opener mishit a shot and skipper Riyan Parag took a good catch.
Medium-pace bowler Brijesh Sharma took two wickets in an over to further corner Lucknow, who survived just 18 overs in their fourth straight defeat.
Archer, who reached a top speed of 151.6 km/h (94.2 mph), mopped up the final two wickets to seal victory for Rajasthan.
Ravindra Jadeja top-scored for Rajasthan with his unbeaten 43 off 29 balls, an effort that steered Rajasthan to 159-6 after they had slumped to 110-6.
Mohammed Shami struck two early blows with successive deliveries to dismiss Yashasvi Jaiswal (22) and Jurel for a duck.
Fellow quick Mohsin Khan then removed 15-year-old T20 sensation Vaibhav Sooryavanshi for eight to further hamper Rajasthan.
Shami, Mohsin and Prince Yadav claimed two wickets each but Jadeja kept up the fight and put on an unbeaten stand of 49 for the seventh wicket with impact substitute Shubham Dubey, who made 19.
Shimron Hetmyer (22), Parag and Donovan Ferreira — who both scored 20 — also contributed to the Rajasthan total.
Source: Khaleej Times