In the second battle of IPL 2021, Delhi capitals faced Chennai Super Kings at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai on 10 April 2021. The Wankhede Stadium comes at number 2 position after the Chinnaswamy Stadium for hitting the most number of Sixes. As the wickets were good for batsman and with the shorter boundaries meant a big total in the match.
Delhi played the final in the last session while Chennai for the first time did not qualify for the playoff. Rishabh Pant was selected as the new captain of Delhi Capitals and was leading the team for the first time in IPL 2021. That was the encounter of two different generations. The two teams had fought 23 times in the history of IPL, Chennai had won 15 matches and Delhi won 8 times. Shreyas Iyer was out for the entire tournament due to injury. Delhi capitals also missed their pacers Kagiso Rabada and Anrich Nortje.
Delhi included Stoinis, Hetmyer, Woakes, Tom Curran and Chennai included Faf, Moeen, Sam, & Bravo as their overseas players.
Delhi won the toss and decided to have the ball in hand first. Ruturaj Gaikwad and Faf du Plessis were on the crease and Chris Woakes got the new ball in hand. The top order of Chennai failed to give a good start as Faf du Plessis was sent back by Avesh Khan in the second over and in the very next over of Chris Woakes, Ruturaj Gaikwad was caught by Dhawan at the first slip. Moen Ali and Suresh Raina tried to handle the situation and added 53 runs for the third wicket. Moen Ali was looking comfortable with the bat but Ashwin sent him back in 8.3 overs. After the dismissal, Ambati Rayudu came out to join Raina and struck some nice shots and both the batsmen added valuable 63 runs for the 4th wicket. After the dismissal of Rayudu in 13.5 overs, Suresh Raina was, unfortunately, run out by Chris Woakes and Pant. Once again, Chennai was in trouble, and that was not the end there, Dhoni was also bowled for 0 by Avesh Khan. Avesh Khan performed superbly with the ball as it had taken 2 important wickets. Chennai lost the last three wickets within 14 runs only. Finally, Chennai successfully added 188 runs on the board as Sam Curran and Jadeja finished the inning well in death overs. Delhi Capitals needed 189 runs from 120 balls to win the 2nd match of IPL 2021. Chris Woakes and Avesh Khan took 2 wickets each.
Prithvi Shaw who had already performed well in the Vijay Hazare Trophy came out with Shikhar Dhawan to chase the target. Delhi capitals started superbly and maintained the run rate of almost 11 runs per over till 6 overs. Prithvi Shaw and Shikhar Dhawan attacked Chennai’s seamer from the beginning and then MS Dhoni brought Jadeja into the attack. In 7.2 over, there was a chance to catch Prithvi Shaw but he was dropped by Santner because of some miscommunication between Bravo and Santner. Prithvi Shaw completed his 50 runs off 27 balls and Dhawan also got his fifty from 35 balls in the next over. Both the openers had already added more than 100 runs of partnership for the 1st wicket and that was not a good sign for CSK. Delhi Capitals were dominating the opposition with a run rate of 10 or more per over. Finally, Chennai got the first breakthrough of Shaw in 13.3 overs. After the dismissal, Rishabh Pant came to join Dhawan. Shikhar Dhawan was sent back by Shardul Thakur in 16.3 overs but Dhawan had already done his job. Finally Delhi got the target very easily in 18.4 overs and won the 2nd match of the Indian Premier League 2021 by 7 wickets with 8 balls remaining and got 2 points.
Shikhar Dhawan was named Man of the Match..