IPL – Pathirana, Theekshana guide Chennai to Playoffs

CHRIS DHAMBARAGE

COLOMBO – Sri Lanka’s Matheesha Pathirana and Maheesh Theekshana were the cynosure of all eyes as they combined effectively to help the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) record a comprehensive 77-run victory over Delhi Capitals (DC) in the 67th match of the Indian Premier League (IPL) played at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in New Delhi on Saturday.

The Sri Lankan pace-spin combination shared four wickets between them as DC were restricted to 146 for nine wickets after CSK had elected to bat first and piled up an imposing 223 for three in 20 overs.

Off-spinner Theekshana captured the wickets of Lalit Yadav (6) and Kuldeep Yadav (0) to return excellent figures of two for 23 from four overs while slinger Pathirana accounted for the DC top scorer David Warner (86) and Hakim Khan (7) to finish off with two wickets for 22 in four overs.

This win has now confirmed CSK’s place in the 2023 IPL Playoffs, and they are now favourites to finish in the top two as well. CSK also extended their record of being the team with the most appearances in the IPL Playoffs — 12 times in 14 seasons.

CSK Skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni was the first to commend the performances of Theekshana and Pathirana after they became the second team to secure a place in the knock-outs behind the defending champions Gujarat Titans.

“When it comes to death bowling, confidence is a very important factor. Pathirana is quite a natural player when it comes to bowling at the death so that is one less headache. The way Tushar has come around has been remarkable,” Dhoni stressed after the game.

Meanwhile, Pathirana moved to 11th place in the highest number of wickets in IPL 2023 with a total of 15 scalps from 10 matches at an average of 19.33 and an economy rate of 7.56.

In addition, this was Theekshana’s best figures in IPL 2023  and so far, he has nine wickets to his credit from 11 matches at an economy rate of 8.00.

Earlier, CSK got off to a brisk start courtesy of some beautiful shots from Ruturaj Gaikwad and Devon Conway as they added 141 for the first wicket in just 14.3 overs.

The pair mixed it up beautifully as they kept rotating the strike along with hitting the odd boundary after Conway had brought up the 1,000th six of IPL 2023 with a straight six in the opening over.

Chief scores
Chennai Super Kings: 223/3 in 20 overs (Raturaj Gaikwad 79, Devon Conway 87, Shivam Dube 22, Ravindra Jadeja 20 n.o)
Delhi Capitals: 146/9 in 20 overs (David Warner 86, Deepak Chahar 3/22, Mahesh Theekshana 2/23, Matheesha Pathirana 2/22).