New Delhi [India], April 28 : Two veteran institutions of pace bowling, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Josh Hazlewood, flipped the narrative of the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) season about sky-high 200-plus totals, endless barrage of sixes, the psychological edge of the 'Impact Player', delivering the most lowest scoring encounter of the tournament so far, bringing a dry, batting-friendly surface to life with their sheer class, movement, accuracy and bounce.
Before the match started, the surface was assessed to be a batting-friendly one. It came as no surprise, as just two days back, a record-breaking 152* by KL Rahul had propelled DC to a monstrous 264/2, only for an ultra-ruthless Punjab Kings (PBKS) to burp it down like a hearty plate of street-style chole bhature and lassi within a matter of 18.5 overs.
But fast forward to Monday evening, and batters were made to pay for even daring to swing at the ball, with the venom in Hazlewood and Bhuvneshwar's deliveries putting the batters on life support, gasping for air.
As RCB opted to field, Patidar suggested during the toss that he was in no mood for revenge after a last-over thriller at Bengaluru went to the Blue and Red side. However, Bhuvneshwar and Hazlewood suggested otherwise. The first ball to debutant Sahil Parakh, an under-19 batter, was a nervy outside edge, characteristic of a debutant.
The next ball, a snarly, swinging yorker that crashed into Sahil's middle stump, sending him for a duck. The youngster had a tough initiation into the bigger stage, courtesy of this era's swing bowling championship belt holder.
Bhuvi spent the rest of the over testing KL and Nitish Rana, the Saturday's heroes, with a testing off-stump line and tight length. Next over, Hazlewood took the ball. First ball, slammed onto the deck like a pro wrestler would bodyslam his opponent.
KL Rahul got the top edge of this bumper, which landed in Jitesh Sharma's hands. Being the great leveller the sport is, the domineering hero of the previous match was sent back for just one.
On the next delivery, Sameer Rizvi gave in to an outside off-stump trap, with Jitesh once again in the thick of action and Hazlewood on a hat-trick. Hazlewood ended his first over with some tough questions for DC batters.
Next over, Bhuvneshwar came back again, teasing and testing his opponents with the outside off stump line and baiting Stubbs (5) and skipper Axar Patel (0) in his trap. Half of the DC side sat helpless in the dugout during the third over itself.
Fourth over, Hazlewood tested Nitish by mixing up his lengths, bringing in the outside off line quite often. On the fifth delivery, Nitish gave in. Trying to escape the bounce generated by Hazlewood, but cramped for room, the ball kissed his glove and went to Devdutt Padikkal at gully.
Rana, who had scored a 44-ball 91 on Saturday, was the sixth wicket down at a score of eight for nine balls. Quite an amazing flip of numbers nine and one on his stat sheet within two days, forcing Nitish into a strict diet after a party on Saturday.
Bhuvneshwar tested David Miller with a variety of lengths and different lines, giving away two runs. Next over, Hazlewood brought back his elite 140+ clicks pace, putting 'Impact Player' Abishek Porel to test, who was just perhaps happy to have opened his run tally.
DC ended the worst power play in IPL history at 13/6 in six overs. For the first time, two bowlers managed to get three scalps each within the same over within the powerplay. Hazlewood walked away, conceding just eight runs, while Bhuvneshwar gave away just five. The top-order left behind a hockey match-like scoreline and a scorecard reading like a phone number from top to down.
This was the second instance of six wickets being lost in a powerplay in an IPL game, after Kochi Tuskers Kerala had slipped to 29/6 against Deccan Chargers 15 years back. Bhuvneshwar, ageing like fine wine at 36, continued his powerplay dominance, levelling with Trent Boult for most powerplay wickets since IPL 2023, with 32 each.
By removing Sahil in the first over, this was the 29th instance of Bhuvneshwar hunting down in the first over itself in an IPL inning, four short of Boult (32).
Later, some bowling from Rasikh Salam Dar and Romario brought some boundaries, as Miller and Abishek collected runs freely for a while. Just when it seemed that Miller would wear his 'clutch' suit, Rasikh baited him into pulling a delivery outside the off-stump line, only for the batter to get the top-edge and hand Jitesh his fourth catch of the day. Miller was back in the hut for 19, with DC at 43/7 in nine overs.
Spin was introduced in the ninth over, with Suyash Sharma and Krunal Pandya starting something just as bad as the Hazlewood-Bhuvneshwar beatdown. While the top-edges, nicks, 'oohhhs and aaahsss' were heard against pace, it was mostly silence against spin.
A young Suyash and Krunal bowled six overs together, conceding just 16 runs and taking a wicket each. While Kyle Jamieson let DC reach a team half-century against Romario Shepherd, the "trendsetter" Krunal (as termed by mentor Dinesh Karthik during the PC earlier) and a young Suyash put DC in a sleeper hold, rendering their bats useless.
Suyash used his smarts at his home ground for Delhi, produced 20 dots in his spell of 1/7 in four overs, while Krunal generated four of those during his two-over spell of nine runs. Neither conceded a single boundary nor a six.
On a fitting note, the Hazlewood took the final wicket of the day, ending Porel's resistance at 33-ball 30, with three fours. DC was all-out for 75 in 16.3 overs. This was their third-lowest all-out score and the third time they were skittled out for 75 runs or less, rivalled only by, funnily enough, RCB. RCB went from facing those dark days to dishing them out mercilessly.
Bhuvneshwar (3/5) secured his 20th three-wicket haul in the IPL, leapfrogging pace legend Lasith Malinga (19). He is just now six below Jasprit Bumrah, who has 25 of them.
Also, Hazlewood, back to his venomous best, registered the second-best figures during RCB vs DC in IPL after 5/25 by Jaydev Unadkat (for RCB) at the same venue in 2013.
Heading into the run-chase, the DC crowd, expecting a run-chase, felt parched and deprived of an average modern-day IPL run-fest, with totals in excess of 200, rarely below 180-190. RCB satiated the crowd's appetite with a small slog-fest.
While Jacob Bethell launched Jamieson for two sixes, including a 104-metre monster, a sharp catch by T Natrajan sent him back for an 11-ball 20. Once again, Virat Kohli and Devdutt Padikkal found themselves putting a partnership together. Padikkal (34* in 13 balls, with three fours and three sixes) trimmed down the deficit to just 15 runs in 15 overs, thumping a lanky Jamieson for two sixes and two fours in the fifth over.
Just after the powerplay got over, during which Virat climbed the IPL's 'mount 9k', the local boy slammed Natrajan for two back-to-back sixes, ending the game in 6.3 overs, scoring 23* in 15 balls himself, with two sixes and a four.
This was the second-fastest run-chase in terms of balls remaining: 81, next to 87 balls remaining during the MI vs KKR clash back in 2008, where MI were set just 68 runs. RCB also completed their 21st win over DC in their 35 encounters, dominating the rivalry.
During the post-match, even Patidar, who "absolutely" cherished this win as a "sweet revenge" as asked, was surprised by the trick pitch and the cricket ball played together.
He outlined his team's ultra-aggressive strategy of giving Bhuvneshwar and Hazlewood three overs each in powerplay if they got early wickets and expressed happiness at Suyash's "stump to stump bowling".
Hazlewood, the 'Player of the Match', was "not sure what was going to happen", having read and perhaps witnessed the run-fest just two days back. He spoke of following "Bhuvi's lead" and hailed Suyash for "dotting things up".
Axar, a reliable, crisis-managing vice-captain for India who has ended on the right side of results in national colours more often than not, once again was left stunned by what had transpired. Nonetheless, the skipper highlighted the need to stay positive, hard-working and praised two pace maestros for their world-class bowling.
"I still cannot understand what happened. But each day, you have to be on your toes and keep doing what you have been doing well. You cannot take it easy for even one day. Rather than thinking about what has happened, think about what is to come. Even if you stay negative or positive, you still have to play. Tonight was a bad day. We have to be positive and do what we had been doing (earlier). They (Bhuvneshwar and Hazlewood) are world-class bowlers. 1-2 overs, if our openers and number three had batted, it could have been a different game," he signed off.
While the chatter around high-scoring matches still stands justified by the sheer volume of such matches produced, on a Monday night, when the majority of the country had logged into their devices at work, and some had shown up for the match, Hazlewood and Bhuvneshwar for a brief while, made pace bowling cool again and offered a ray of hope that a specialist bowler still has a purpose in a league having recently been dominated by jaw-dropping, flashy batting numbers.
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