A rare off day for Fizz

It was one of those rare off days for Mustafizur Rahman and his team Sunrisers Hyderabad that suffered a punishing seven-wicket defeat against Delhi Daredevils at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium yesterday.

The Bangladesh pace prodigy went for 39 runs in his four overs without any success as Hyderabad failed to defend a sub-par score of 146. Mustafizur, who has so far captured 13 wickets in side's impressive runs in this year's IPL, conceded eight runs in his first over.

He was expensive in his second and fourth over. Rishabh Pant and Sanju Samson, who put on 72 runs for the unbroken fourth wicket, took their side to an easy win with 11 balls to spare.

Pant, who struck 39 off 26 balls after South African opener Quniton de Kock had laid the foundation with 44, was particularly savage on those Mustafizur low full tosses, smashing two sixes against him. It was the most expensive bowling figure for Mustafizur in the IPL where the bowler with lethal cutters earned respect from top batsmen in the world.

Earlier, Sunrisers, who went into the game as leaders of the eight-team table, failed to build on an impressive start. Captain David Warner struck a fluent 44 and his opening partner Shikhar Dhawan scored 34.

But they fell like a pack of cards after that with Yuvraj Singh failing to make any impact, scoring just eight runs. The victory however served as a boost for Daredevils to stay afloat in the race for the four-team knock-out stage.