Salt hits 87 as Delhi thrash Bangalore

England’s Phil Salt hit a blazing 87 to power Delhi Capitals to a thumping seven-wicket victory over Royal Challengers Bangalore in the Indian Premier League on Saturday.
Salt struck his second half-century in his debut IPL season to steer Delhi’s chase of 182 as the home team won with 20 balls to spare at the Feroz Shah Kotla ground.
Salt, a wicketkeeper-batsman, began with a 60-run stand with skipper David Warner, who hit 22, and then put together 59 runs with Mitchell Marsh, who smashed 26. The batting effort trumped Virat Kohli’s 55 and an unbeaten 54 by Mahipal Lomror which helped Bangalore to 181-4 after electing to bat first.
Salt got into a mid-pitch exchange with opposition pace bowler Mohamed Siraj and the verbal duel only spurred him to finish with six sixes in his 45-ball knock.
Leg-spinner Karn Sharma bowled Salt before Rilee Rossouw hit an unbeaten 35 off 22 balls and sealed the match with a six.
Delhi, who started the season with five losses, moved up from the bottom to ninth in the 10-team table with slim chances of making the top four for a place in the play-offs. Delhi’s South African import Anrich Nortje missed the match after he flew back home late Friday due to a “personal emergency”.
The spotlight remained on the Delhi-born Kohli as the former captain set foot on the ground in front of a capacity crowd, mostly wearing the star’s Bangalore jersey.
His every run was cheered and the superstar, who was playing his first game after an ugly spat with Lucknow mentor Gautam Gambhir, obliged the fans with his fifth half-century of the season.
In-form skipper Faf du Plessis, who consolidated his top spot in the batting chart with 511 runs, put on an 82-run opening stand with Kohli. But it was Lomror who set the Bangalore innings on fire with his blitz after Mitchell Marsh sent back Du Plessis, for 45, and Glenn Maxwell, for a first-ball duck.

Pathirana leads Chennai to big win over Mumbai
In Chennai, Sri Lanka’s Matheesha Pathirana led an inspired pace attack to help Chennai Super Kings hammer Mumbai Indians by six wickets in a clash of heavyweights. Pathirana, who is called “Baby Malinga” for his slinging action similar to former Sri Lankan pace ace Lasith Malinga, returned figures of 3-15 to limit five-time winners Mumbai to 139-8 in Chennai.
New Zealand opener Devon Conway made 44 as M.S. Dhoni’s Chennai – four-time IPL champions – romped home with 14 balls to spare. Dhoni praised Pathirana, saying, “People who don’t have any clean action, batsmen have a difficult time picking it. But his consistency, pace makes him special.” Dhoni advised the youngster to stay away from Test cricket and concentrate on playing “only ICC tournaments with ODIs”.
The left-handed Conway put on a strong opening stand of 46 with Ruturaj Gaikwad and moved second in the batting chart with 458 runs behind Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper Faf du Plessis (466). The 41-year-old Dhoni hit the winning run at Chennai’s MA Chidambaram Stadium as fans, who are coming in numbers to cheer the superstar cricketer in what it is expected to be his last IPL season as player, went wild.
Shivam Dube hit an unbeaten 26 off 18 balls as Chennai jumped a spot to second behind table-toppers Gujarat Titans in the 10-team table. Chennai’s bowlers set up victory after they rattled the Mumbai top-order including the key wickets of Cameron Green, out for six after opening the batting, and skipper Rohit Sharma, dismissed for a second successive duck after coming at number three.
The opening pace duo of Deepak Chahar and Tushar Deshpande reduced Mumbai to 14-3 inside three overs before Nehal Wadhera (64) and Suryakumar Yadav (26) attempted to rebuild in their stand of 55. Left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja sent back Suryakumar and the 20-year-old Pathirana, who has played one T20 for Sri Lanka, bowled Wadhera with a yorker – his main weapon – to take the steam out of the Mumbai batting.
Pathirana with a unique celebration of his hands in front of his chest and eyes in meditation said, “I’m a die-hard fan of Cristiano Ronaldo and have modelled my celebration after him.”
Wickets kept tumbling as the dangerous Tim David fell for two off Deshpande and Pathirana got South African batsman Tristan Stubbs for 20.
Brief scoresRoyal Challengers Bangalore 181/4 in 20 overs (Virat Kohli 55, Mahipal Lomror 54; Mitchell Marsh 2-21) lost to Delhi Capitals 187/3 in 16.4 overs (Philip Salt 87, Rilee Rossouw 35; Josh Hazlewood 1-29) by 7 wickets.
Mumbai Indians 139/8 in 20 overs (Nehal Wadhera 64; Matheesha Pathirana 3-15, Deepak Chahar 2-18) lost to Chennai Super Kings 140/4 in 17.4 overs (Devon Conway 44, Ruturaj Gaikwad 30; Piyush Chawla 2-25) by
six wickets