JOHANNESBURG, (Reuters) – Left-arm spinner Yuvraj Singh claimed his second hat-trick in the Indian Premier League yesterday as the Kings XI Punjab beat the Deccan Chargers by one run at the Wanderers.
In the day’s second match the Delhi Daredevils strengthened their hold on top of the standings by cruising past the Rajasthan Royals by 14 runs in Bloemfontein.
Delhi opened up a three-point lead in the standings while Punjab move into fourth place.
Deccan hold on to third place while the defending champion Royals are in fifth place.
After Punjab had posted 134 for seven, Yuvraj picked up the wickets of Herschelle Gibbs, Andrew Symonds and Venugopal Rao with the last ball of the 12th over and the first two deliveries of the 14th as Deccan fell agonisingly close to victory as they reached 133 for eight.
Deccan, who had slipped to 79 for five, were rescued by Rohit Sharma who blasted 42 off 26 balls before falling in the last over of the Chargers’ innings with Deccan needing four runs to win off three balls.
Left-arm swing bowler Irfan Pathan held his nerve as he conceded just two runs while taking a wicket off the last three balls while Yuvraj ended with three for 13 off four overs. Punjab’s total was built around a half-century from Kumar Sangakkara with the Sri Lankan stroking his way to 56 off 43 balls while left-arm seamer Rudra Pratap Singh was Deccan’s stand-out performer with the ball as he captured three for 26.
Delhi scored 150 for three with AB de Villiers carving d his way to an unbeaten 79 off 55 balls.
The South African became the second batsman, after Chennai’s Australia Matthew Hayden, to pass 400 runs In reply, Rajasthan could muster only 36 for nine off their 20 overs.
De Villiers and Sri Lankan Tillakaratne Dilshan (33) set Delhi on their way to a big total with a third-wicket stand of 87 runs off 83 balls before Dilshan was bowled by off spinner Johan Botha
De Villiers and right-handed wicketkeeper Dinesh Karthik (23 not out) then plundered an unbroken fourth-wicket stand of 48 runs off 21 balls.
Rajasthan were never in the contest with their top-score coming from the right-handed Botha who made 37 runs off 31 balls.
