Young left-arm pacer Khaleel Ahmed grabbed three key wickets in an impressive spell to help Sunrisers Hyderabad restrict Delhi Capitals to 155 for 7 in their IPL match here Sunday.
The 21-year-old bowler took the wickets of openers Prithvi Shaw (4) and Shikhar Dhawan (7) as well as that of dangerous Rishabh Pant (23) while conceding 30 runs from his four overs after Delhi were put into bat.
Senior pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar returned with figures of 2/33 while leg-spinner Rashid Khan and Abhishek Sharma took a wicket apiece as the Sunrisers' bowlers made it difficult for Delhi batsmen to score runs.
For Delhi, captian Shreyas Iyer top-scored with a 40-ball 45 and his 56-run partnership with Pant for the fourth wicket took them a challenging total after a wobbly start. Colin Munro was the other notable contributor with a 24-ball 40.
Shreyas hit five fours before he was dismissed by Bhuvneshwar in the 16th over while Munro was more aggressive with four boundaries and three sixes in his 24-ball knock.
Delhi Capitals struggled with openers Dhawan and Shaw back into the dressing room by the fourth over with Ahmed accounting for both the key batsmen.
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Shaw was the first to go in the second over as he was done in by the extra bounce extracted by Ahmed as the batsman ended up edging the delivery to wicketkeeper Jonny Bairstow.
In his next over, Ahmed got rid of Dhawan who miscued a bounceer off the bowler with Bhuvneshwar Kumar taking the catch at fine leg. Dhawan had scored an unbeaten 97 in Delhi's win in their last match against Kolkata Knight Riders.
One-down Munro, however, was in a punishing mood and he smashed Ahmed for a four and a six each in the fourth and sixth overs. Delhi reached to 51 for 2 after six overs.
He was out in the eighth over with Abhishek getting a thin edge off the batsman for Bairstow to take the catch behind the stumps.