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Rajasthan Royals’ all-rounder Riyan Parag earned one of his career’s biggest wickets when he dismissed Punjab Kings’ power-hitter Chris Gayle in the fourth match of the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021. However, more than the wicket, Parag’s experimental delivery grabbed the maximum eyeballs.
It all happened in the 10th over of PBKS innings when Sanju Samson gave Parag the opportunity to show his bowling skills in the Monday night fixture at Wankhede. On the third ball of the over, the Guwahati-lad went round the stumps to deceive ‘Sixer King’ Gayle. He bowled a side-arm delivery, which surprised the batsman, including the commentators on-air.
Parag’s sensational ball reminded many of Sunrisers Hyderabad’s latest recruit Kedar Jadhav, who is known to have bowled side-arm deliveries quite often. But Parag’s round-arm ball was released from a considerably lower height than Jadhav’s delivery.
After the ball, the on-field umpire was spotted having a word with the bowler, possibly telling him that he could not go any lower than that. But it seems like it was a well-planned strategy to get the prized scalp of Gayle as two deliveries later, Parag bowled a classic off-spin that the Jamaican whacked to earn a six. However, it was a mistimed shot as Ben Stokes caught the catch at long-on.
Watch the video here:
This interesting delivery raised eyebrows and earned a warning from the umpire… 🤨 👀 pic.twitter.com/irhMNgjKWz
— Fox Cricket (@FoxCricket) April 13, 2021
Sanju Samson’s heroics goes in vain
In the match, Samson, who was captaining the Royals for the first time, won the toss and asked Kings to bat first. The decision favoured the Mohali-based franchise as PBKS ended up posting a massive 221/6 on the scoreboard in their allotted 20 overs.
KL Rahul and Deepak Hooda completely dominated the proceedings after scoring 91 and 64, respectively, to make sure PBKS crossed the 200-run mark. Gayle, who was outdone by Parag in the game, made a valuable contribution of 40 runs.
In reply, the 2008 IPL winners send shockwaves to Punjab’s unit as the game went to the wire. Skipper Sanju played a breathtaking knock and almost pulled off a spectacular win for his side. The Kerala batsman scored 119 from 63 deliveries featuring 12 fours and seven humungous sixes.
The wicket-keeper strokemaker batted till the last over when the Royals needed five to get over the line on the final ball. However, in an attempt to score the maximum, Sanju got caught out in the deep cover, and Punjab won the contest by a mere 4-run margin.
