Sunrisers Hyderabad dished out a tidy bowling performance, led by Siddarth Kaul, to restrict Rising Pune Supergiant to a modest 148 for eight in their Indian Premier League match here today.
The Hyderabad bowlers dominated the proceedings from the word go after inviting the Pune outfit to take first strike with Kaul returning impressive figures of four for 29 from his four overs, while Rashid Khan (1/18) and Bipul Sharma (1/39) took a wicket apiece.
The Supergiant found the going tough and lost both their openers -- Ajinkya Rahane (22) and Rahul Tripathi (1) -- early and were struggling at 39 for two in the seventh over.
Skipper Steve Smith (34) and Ben Stokes (39) though steadied the rocking boat, putting on 60 runs together for the third wicket, they failed to up the ante.
While Stokes tried to accelerate the innings, Smith just could not get going as he took 39 balls for his 34, which neither had a boundary nor a six.
Stokes top-scored with a 25-ball 39 that included one four and three sixes.
In the end, Mahendra Singh Dhoni tried to increase the tempo in the final few overs before he got out for a well-made 31 off 21 balls, which was studded with two fours and as many sixes.
However, the batsmen at the other end could not provide adequate support to the former India skipper with the team bowlers managing to tightened the noose further.
The last two overs saw three Pune batsmen getting out that included the prized wicket of Dhoni.
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