By Prakash Nair 
New Delhi, April 8: Nobody told the GT that they were supposed to be the struggling side tonight. Two losses coming in. A middle order that had been brutally exposed in both games. Their captain missed the last match with a neck injury. Everything pointed toward another difficult evening for Shubman Gill’s side at the Arun Jaitley Stadium.
Instead, they batted like a team that had been holding something back. Three fifties. A total of 210. And Delhi Capitals, the unbeaten home side with all the confidence in the world, now stare down a 211-run chase they did not see coming quite like this.
The Toss, and Then the First Shock
Axar Patel won the toss and did exactly what everyone expected bowled first. This ground favours chasing sides. Dew comes in. DC had been excellent at chasing all season. It was the obvious call, and nobody questioned it.
Mukesh Kumar got a ball to seam just enough to beat Sai Sudharsan and hit the stumps inside three overs. GT were 19 for 1, and Delhi’s fielders were pumped. The crowd was into it. Looked like the script was writing itself exactly the way DC fans wanted.
Then Jos Buttler walked out and tore that script up completely.
Buttler Was a Different Animal
There have been questions about Buttler all IPL season. He had a rough T20 World Cup. He hadn’t quite found his rhythm in the earlier GT matches. Tonight, though, he looked like a completely different player.
He went after Axar from the very first over he faced. A four, then a six, no hesitation at all. Then came Mukesh Kumar, over three sixes and a four, one after another, each one hit with the kind of authority that makes even opposition supporters stop and applaud.
By the time Kuldeep Yadav finally found a way through him, Buttler had made 52 off just 26 balls. He was cleaned up, trying to go even bigger, but honestly, the job was already done. GT had momentum and a platform they simply hadn’t had in either of their first two games.
Kuldeep got the wicket, but it felt like a consolation. The real damage had already happened.
Gill Came Back and Looked Like He’d Never Been Away
The biggest question mark heading into tonight was Shubman Gill. Neck spasms had kept him out against the Rajasthan Royals. His team had lost that game by six runs while needing 15 off 12, a collapse that still hurts to think about. Tonight, he was back, and you could see inside the first few overs that he was ready.
He didn’t try to smash it from ball one. That’s not Gill’s style anyway. He took his time, watched Buttler explode at the other end, and then gradually started opening up. By the end, he had 70 off 45 balls, five sixes in that knock and had completely changed the complexion of GT’s innings from what it might have been without him.
The partnership he built with Washington Sundar was worth 104 runs for the third wicket, and that is where this match was really won with the bat. Delhi couldn’t separate them. Tried Natarajan, tried Axar, tried the shorter stuff. Nothing worked for long enough.
Lungi Ngidi eventually got Gill caught at the boundary by Nitish Rana, and the GT captain walked back knowing he had done his job. GT were well past 170 when he went. The rest was finishing work.
Washington Sundar Reminded Everyone He Can Actually Bat
This is the part of tonight that deserves more attention than it will probably get.
Washington Sundar has always been seen primarily as a bowling all-rounder. You bring him in for his off-spin, for his economy, for his ability to stop the flow in the middle overs. His batting is considered a bonus, never the main point.
Tonight he scored 55 off 32 balls, his maiden IPL fifty, and it was not some slog-fest at the death. It was proper batting. He rotated, he timed, he found gaps, and when the opportunity came to go big, he went. It was the kind of innings that makes you wonder why he hasn’t batted higher more regularly.
Mukesh got him eventually a clever full toss angling back in, Sundar tried to go over the top and lobbed a catch to Rana at extra cover. The GT dressing room stood and clapped. That knock had genuinely shifted this game.
The Last Push: Phillips Finishes It Off
With three wickets down and the innings in its final stretch, Glenn Phillips came in and did exactly what a lower-order finisher should do. No heroics needed, just clean hitting and smart running.
He swung one over midwicket for a six to take GT past 200, and suddenly the total looked very different from what it had been five overs earlier.
GT maintained a run rate of over 10 runs per over between overs 7 and 15 sustained, consistent, never letting DC get comfortable. That is not a fluke. That is a batting lineup that finally fired across all three phases of the innings, not just the powerplay.
What the DC Bowlers Got Right and Wrong
Mukesh Kumar deserves credit. He got Sudharsan early, and he got Sundar in the death. Two wickets for the night, and he bowled with discipline even when the runs were flowing around him.
Kuldeep’s dismissal of Buttler was a beautiful delivery sharp, spinning late, absolutely unplayable. That wicket could have changed things. It didn’t, because Gill and Sundar just kept going.
Axar was expensive. That does not happen often. Natarajan went for runs in the death. And at this ground, on this surface, when a batting lineup finds its rhythm, there is not much any bowling attack can do except minimize the damage. DC didn’t quite manage even that in the final five overs.
GT’s First Innings The Numbers
Sai Sudharsan: 8 early, dragged onto stumps off Mukesh Jos Buttler: 52 off 26 dismissed by Kuldeep, bowled Shubman Gill: 70 off 45 caught Rana at boundary off Ngidi Washington Sundar: 55 off 32 caught Rana at cover off Mukesh Glenn Phillips: quick cameo in the death, pushed GT past 200
Final score: 210 for 4 in 20 overs
So Now Delhi Need 211
Pathum Nissanka smashed three boundaries off Mohammed Siraj in the very first over of the DC chase. The crowd woke up instantly. DC had 20 runs on the board inside two overs, and suddenly 211 didn’t seem so impossible.
But then, 211 never seems impossible for this Delhi side. They chased 142 from 26 for 4. They chased 163 from 7 for 2. Every single time they have been in trouble this season, someone has rescued them.
The real question tonight is whether this is too many runs on too big a night for a team that has been winning on individual brilliance rather than collective batting.
Sameer Rizvi will come in at some point. He always does. And Rashid Khan will be waiting for him with that sharp zip off the pitch, bowling at speeds that make even set batters think twice.
This could go anywhere. And that, honestly, is exactly what an IPL match should feel like at the halfway stage.
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- Prakash Nair
- Prakash Nair
- Prakash Nair
- Prakash Nair
