Kimberley, May 10 (Inditop) Subramaniam Badrinath and Matthew Hayden Saturday took Chennai Super Kings to the top of the Indian Premier League (IPL) table with a seven-wicket victory over title-holders Rajasthan Royals at the De Beers Diamond Oval here.
Super Kings, with 13 points, have now toppled Delhi Daredevils to emerge as the new leaders while Rajasthan Royals are in the third place with 11 points.
Electing to bat, Rajasthan Royals were restricted to 140 for seven by a disciplined Super Kings side. Man of the Match Badrinath (59 not out) and Hayden (48) then stitched a 89-run partnership to steer Super Kings home with 10 balls to spare.
Hayden, who has been in envious form this IPL, produced another impressive 44-ball innings but it was Badrinath who emerged the star of Chennai innings. Badrinath played a whirlpool innings off 41 balls that was studded with nine fours and a six.
Hayden and Badrinath steadied the Super Kings innings after Murli Vijay (10) and Suresh Raina (13) departed with only 37 runs on the board.
Hayden and Badrinath joined forces to rip apart the Rajasthan Royals bowling. Badrinath hit Shane Harwood for 20 runs in one over to put his side on the threshold of their sixth win.
Earlier, Super Kings bowled a tight length backed by a sharp fielding to tie down Rajasthan Royals to a modest total.
Albie Morkel gave Super Kings the breakthrough in the third ball of the match, clipping the bails of in-form batsman Naman Ojha. Graeme Smith (30) and Swapnil Asnodkar (26) then tried to repair the damage, adding 53 runs for the second wicket.
Asnodkar, who so far has been a pale shadow of his performance last year, showed signs of form in his 25-ball knock, which included in three fours and a six, but couldn’t carry on for long, being trapped leg before by Muttiah Murlitharan in the ninth over.
Smith became Murlitharan’s second victim when he was stumped by a composed Mahendra Singh Dhoni to leave Royals tottering at 75 for three.
Ravindra Jadeja (27) looked to bring things back on track but Dhoni brought back Laksmipathi Balaji to pack off Jadeja in the 15th over. Skipper Shane Warne produced some fireworks towards the end with an unbeaten 21 off 11 balls but that was not enough to produce a winning total.
rounak