Rajasthan Royals came out with a commanding  all- round show and strengthened their play-offs chances  with an emphatic 7 wicket win over Lucknow Super Giants in a Tata IPL 2024 encounter.

Earlier Sanju Samson won the toss and opted to field . LSG were rocked early as Quinton de Kock was bowled by Trent Boult for 8. It was the 27th time in power play first over that Boult had taken a wicket. Marcus Stoinis was bowled by beauty from Sandeep Sharma for 0 .

Skipper K L Rahul 76 ( 48 balls , 8 fours 1 six) and Deepak Hooda 50 ( 31 balls 7 fours) gave LSG total some respect. But they lost wickets regularly . Nicholas Pooran 11. Ayush Badoni not out 18 and Krunal Pandya not out 11 saw LSG reach 196/ 5 in their 20 overs.

RR Bowling figures : Trent Boult 1/ 41 ( 4 overs). Sandeep Sharma 2/ 31 ( 4 overs) , Avesh Khan 1/ 42 ( 4 overs), Yuzvendra Chahal 0/ 41 ( 4 overs0 a rare off day. Ravichandran Ashwin 1/ 39 ( 4 overs)

In reply RR were on course . Openers Yashasvi Jaiswal 24 and Jos Buttler 34 gave them the flying start putting on 60-1, 5.5 overs . Then Skipper Sanju Samson showed  his class and boosted his chances of place in the Indian team for the T20 2024 WC with a blistering innings an unbeaten one too 71 ( 33 balls , 7 fours 4 sixes).  Samson hit the winning six  to finish the match in style .

Samson along with talented Dhruv Jurel who scored an impressive unbeaten 52 ( 34 balls , 5 fours 2 sixes) saw RR home by 7 wickets and six balls to spare . Riyan Parag as impact player was out for 14 . RR were never really under threat in the chase.

LSG bowling : Matt Henry 0/ 32 ( 3 overs), Mohsin Khan 0/ 52 ( 4 overs), Yash Thakur 1/ 50 ( 4 overs), Marcus Stoinis 1/ 3  ( 1 over) was surprisingly  not brought on after taking the wicket of  Yashasvi Jaiswal by K L Rahul.  Krunal Pandya 0/ 24 ( 4 overs ), Amit Mishra 1/ 20 ( 2 overs), Ravi Bishnoi 0/ 16 ( 1 over)

LSG Impact Player: Amit Mishra replaces Quinton de Kock RR Impact Player: Riyan Parag replaces Yuzvendra Chahal