Jaipur: It was a veterans day out at Sawai Man Singh Stadium as 38-year-old Brad Hodge and 41-year-old Pravin Tambe engineered a comfortable 30-run victory for Rajasthan Royals against Highveld Lions of South Africa in a group league match of the CLT20 here on Wednesday night.
Royals thus kept their unbeaten record at home intact with 10th straight win (eight wins in IPL).
While Hodge’s 23-ball-46 helped Royals reach a comfortable 183 for five in 20 overs, leg-spinner Tambe had his moment under the floodlights with dream figures of 3-0-15-4 to restrict Lions to 153 for nine in 20 overs.
Tambe, who was just another club cricketer plying his trade in Mumbai maidans before the last edition of the IPL, ran through the Lions’ middle-order with his fast leg-breaks.
Tambe cleaned up Hardus Viljoen (24) and rival captain Alviro Peterson (40) with fastish deliveries.
He mixed it up cleverly, getting Jean Symes with one flighted outside off-stump and Sohail Tanvir with a fullish delivery that found him plumb in-front.
For someone who just had one wicket from three T20 matches (all played during the last IPL), Tambe was on spot from the word go.
Not a big turner of the ball, the gritty Mumbaikar did find his spot and kept hitting it with a slight hint of leg-break.
By the end of his spell, the shouts of “Pravin Pravin” by the Royals supporters was a fitting tribute to the man whose best days in Mumbai club cricket clashed with that of Sairaj Bahutule, who was Mumbai’s first-choice leg-break bowler for a decade.
Just like the first match, unheralded Himachal Pradesh seamer Vikramjeet Malik (2/26 in three overs) struck early blows with some disciplined bowling as Rajasthan now are on top of Group A with a very bright chance of making it to the semifinals.
Earlier, T20 freelancer Brad Hodge showed why he is sought after in the shortest format as he blasted his way to 23-ball-46 which included six fours and two sixes.
He got 20 out off the 21 runs that came off the final over of the innings, bowled by Pakistani left-arm seamer Sohail Tanvir.
All-rounder Stuart Binny played a nice cameo, smashing 38 off only 20 balls while experienced Shane Watson (33, 24 balls, 4×4, 2×6) and veteran skipper Rahul Dravid (31, 30 balls, 5×4) also made useful contributions.
While Royals managed only 69 in the front 10, the back-10 proved to be far more profitable with a whopping 114 runs coming off it.
Royals skipper Dravid looked in good touch during his knock of 31.
A couple of cover drives off Tsotsobe were a treat for the eyes while a pull of Viljoen was vintage stuff.
The 13th over of the Royals innings proved to be ‘lucky’ for the home team as Watson and Binny slammed left-arm spinner Aaron Phangiso to all corners scoring 22 runs from that over which included two huge sixes hit over long-on and long-off by the Aussie all-rounder.
That was when the Royals finally managed to break the shackles as an even 100 was scored off the last eight overs. (PTI)
SCORECARD
Rajasthan Royals:
R Dravid c P’rsen b Pretorius 31
A Rahane c Viljoen b Tanvir 6
S Samson c T’lekile b T’sobe 12
S Watson c Symes b T’sobe 33
S Binny b Pretorius 38
B Hodge not out 46
A Menaria not out 6
Extras: (lb-1, w-7, nb-3) 11
Total: (5 wkts; 20 overs) 183
FOW: 1-21, 2-36, 3-67, 4-110, 5-145
Bowling: Tsotsobe 4-0-26-2, Tanvir 4-0-36-1, Viljoen 4-0-41-0, Pretorius 4-0-27-2, Phangiso 4-0-52-0
Lions:
H vd Dussen c Dravid b Malik 14
Q de Kock c Menaria b W’son 18
T Bavuma c Samson b Malik 0
G Viljoen b Tambe 24
A Petersen b Tambe 40
J Symes c Binny b Tambe 3
S Tanvir lbw Tambe 0
T Tsolekile b Faulkner 21
D P’torius c Hodge b Faulkner 19
A Phangiso not out 4
L Tsotsobe not out 0
Extras: (b-5, lb-2, w-3) 10
Total: (9 wkts; 20 overs) 153
FOW: 1-25, 2-36, 3-36, 4-89, 5-101, 6-101, 7-120, 8-137, 9-152
Bowling: Malik 3-0-26-2, Faulkner 4-0-22-2, Watson 4-0-27-1, Binny 2-0-17-0, Cooper 4-0-39-0, Tambe 3-0-15-4