AHMEDABAD, India: Little-known Shashank Singh smashed a 25-ball half-century and led Punjab Kings to a three-wicket win over Gujarat Titans in the Indian Premier League on Thursday.
Singh clubbed four sixes and six boundaries in his unbeaten 61 off 29 balls as Punjab roared back to reach 200-7 for its second win in four games and hand Gujarat its first loss at home in three games.
Captain Shubman Gill had earlier anchored Gujarat to 199-4 after Punjab had won the toss and elected to field at a sprawling Narendra Modi Stadium.
Punjab lost both its openers — captain Shikhar Dhawan (1) and Jonny Bairstow (22) — inside the batting power play with Dhawan chopping Umesh Yadav’s first ball back onto his stumps while Bairstow was outdone by Afghan spinner Noor Ahmad and was clean bowled.
Sam Curran’s (5) promotion didn’t work out for Punjab as the Englishman offered a tame catch to Kane Williamson but Singh’s arrival at the wicket in the ninth over kept Punjab in the hunt as the right-handed batter showed plenty of aggression.
Jitesh Sharma struck back-to-back sixes to Rashid Khan (1-40) before missing out on a full toss and gave Afghanistan’s star spinner his 50th IPL wicket with Punjab still needing 50 off the final 27 balls.
Impact player Ashutosh Sharma then capitalized on two early dropped catches and smashed 31 off 17 balls as Yadav and Sai Sudharsan missed out catching opportunities in the deep, but Singh continued to hold one end up.
Earlier, Gill upped the ante in the death overs with Rahul Tewatia smashing unbeaten 23 off just eight balls which featured three boundaries and a six.
Williamson made a quiet start to the season in his first game for his new franchise as the New Zealand skipper made 26 off 22 balls before he was caught at backward point in the ninth over.
Gill pushed the scoring rate by adding 53 runs with Sudharsan, who made 33 off 19 balls, before dominating the pace of Kagiso Rabada (2-44) and Harshal Patel (1-44) in the death overs.
Shashank Singh’s half-century earns Punjab thrilling 3-wicket win over Gujarat in IPL
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Shashank Singh’s half-century earns Punjab thrilling 3-wicket win over Gujarat in IPL
- Singh clubbed four sixes and six boundaries in his unbeaten 61 off 29 balls as Punjab roared back to reach 200-7 for its second win in four games
- Captain Shubman Gill had earlier anchored Gujarat to 199-4 after Punjab had won the toss and elected to field at a sprawling Narendra Modi Stadium
Qatar’s Al-Attiyah wins Stage 6 for Dacia, retakes Dakar lead
- Al-Attiyah, 55, has now completed 19 successive Dakars with at least one stage win every time
RIYADH: Qatar’s Nasser Al-Attiyah will lead the Dakar Rally into its second and final week after winning the sixth stage in the Saudi desert on Friday to take over at the top from South African rival Henk Lategan.
Al-Attiyah, a five-time Dakar winner now competing for the Dacia Sandriders, had been second overnight but turned a deficit of more than three minutes into a 6 minutes and 10 second advantage over the 326km timed stage between Hail
and Riyadh.
Saturday is a rest day before the rally resumes in Riyadh on Sunday with seven more stages to the finish in Yanbu on the Red Sea coast on Jan. 17.
Al-Attiyah won Friday’s stage by two minutes and 58 seconds from teammate and nine-time world rally champion Sebastien Loeb, Dacia’s first Dakar one-two, with Toyota’s American
Seth Quintero third.
Overall, three different manufacturers filled podium positions with Toyota’s Lategan second and Ford’s Nani Roma third — his first time on the virtual podium since 2019.
Al-Attiyah, 55, has now completed 19 successive Dakars with at least one stage win
every time.
Friday was his career 49th stage win in the car category — one off the record held jointly by Ari Vatanen and “Mr Dakar” Stephane Peterhansel.
Spaniard Carlos Sainz, father of the Formula One driver and a four-time Dakar winner still racing hard at the age of 63, was in fourth place for Ford with teammate Mattias Ekstrom fifth and Loeb sixth.
American Mitch Guthrie, stage winner on Thursday for Ford, dropped to seventh from sixth.
In the motorcycle category there was no change at the top, although leader and defending champion Daniel Sanders was handed a 6-minute penalty for riding at 98kph in a zone limited to 50kph.
KTM rider Sanders now leads Honda’s American Ricky Brabec, the stage winner after the Australian’s penalty, by 45 seconds with Argentine rider Luciano Benavides more than 10 minutes behind in third.
“It was an emotional rollercoaster all day. Unfortunately, I got a speeding penalty, so that will set me back a bit,”
said Sanders.
“I just pushed as much as I could today but it’s hard to do good in the sand, especially opening. I did the best I could and I’ve got to stop making silly mistakes. I haven’t pieced this first week together so well.”
