Gujarat Titans (GT) opened their IPL 2022 campaign in an impressive fashion as they registered a thrilling five-wicket victory over Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on Monday (March 28).
Asked to bat first, LSG posted 158/6 in their 20 overs on the back of half-centuries from Deepak Hooda (55 off 41 balls) and Ayush Badoni (54 off 41 balls).
Pacer Mohammad Shami was the stand-out bowler for Gujarat as he returned with the figures of 3 for 25 in his four overs. Leg-spinner Rashid Khan also finished with impressive bowling figures of 1/27 in four overs.
In reply, GT got off to a terrible start as they lost Shubman Gill (0) and Vijay Shankar (4) cheaply. Skipper Hardik Pandya and Matthew Wade put on 57 runs for the third wicket to bail the team out of trouble. However, both of them got out in quick succession in 30s which left the Titans reeling at 78/4.
Amid the pressure situation, the duo of David Miller and Rahul Tewatia rose to the occasion and added 60 runs for the fifth wicket. While Miller got out for 30, Tewatia held the one firmly.
In the death overs, Tewatia took the Lucknow bowlers to the cleaners and returned with the score of 24-ball 40* while Abhinav Manohar played a dazzling cameo of 7-ball 15* as GT got over the line with two balls to spare.
For showing nerves of steel during the chase, Rahul Tewatia and Abhinav Manohar received rich praise from the cricket fraternity on Twitter.
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