David Miller has been here before in IPL 2026. Against Gujarat Titans, he had turned down the tie and ended up costing Delhi Capitals (DC) the game. Ten days later, Miller was in a similar situation once again.
Except on Saturday, he won the game for DC with a ball to spare, handing Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) their second defeat of the season and first at home.
It came down to DC needing 15 off the final over bowled by Romario Shepherd, who was bowling his first of the game.
Miller had missed out on the first ball—a hittable delivery on leg stump that cost RCB just one run—and Tristan Stubbs also managed only a single next ball, leaving DC needing 13 off four balls.
Miller completed his redemption arc with 6, 6, 4 off the next three balls to stun the Chinnaswamy into silence.
Virat Kohli and Phil Salt gave RCB a swift start on a slower-than-usual Chinnaswamy pitch after they were asked to bat first. Kohli nicked the second ball he faced from Auqib Nabi between slip and short third, and Mukesh Kumar also found swing in his opening over.
But nothing could stop Kohli from shimming out of his crease twice and pumping Mukesh for a pair of fours over cover.
However, when he tried to treat Lungi Ngidi in a similar way in the last over of the powerplay, the seamer shifted his line wider of off and had Kohli caught at sweeper cover—the only man on the boundary on the off side—for 19 off 13 balls.
In comparison, Salt had managed just 13 off his first 13 balls but turned up the tempo when he took Nabi for 4, 6, 4 in the fifth over. When he cracked Kuldeep Yadav over wide long-off for six, he brought up his half-century off 30 balls.
Salt hit Kuldeep for another six before the left-arm wristspinner pushed one away from Salt’s swinging arc and had the batter holing out to wide long-off this time for 63 off 38 balls.
The slowness in the surface also played a part in Salt’s dismissal.
Kuldeep and his captain Axar Patel combined to slow RCB down even further. Axar, who had delayed his introduction into the attack until the tenth over, possibly because of the presence of Devdutt Padikkal, managed to have the left-hand batter caught at long-on, though he had erred too full.
Tim David rose above the conditions and ran away to 26 off 15 balls. His drilled six off Ngidi in the 12th over had Kohli off his seat in the dressing room and the Chinnaswamy erupting in joy. Axar, though, played killjoy when he drew an outside edge from David that landed into the hands of short third.
David had denied Jitesh Sharma strike and turned down a single off the previous ball, but Axar shifted his line wide of off and bested David with turn.
Rajat Patidar had already been dismissed by Mukesh Kumar for 8 and Shepherd couldn’t fire either, Kuldeep trapping the West Indian allrounder lbw for 1. The pressure piled on RCB as they went 25 balls without a boundary until Jitesh found it in the 18th over. It should have been a catch at short third, but the ball evaded Mukesh’s outstretched left hand and snuck away to the deep-third boundary. Mukesh, who had landed face-first into the ground, left the field in discomfort after completing his four overs.
RCB didn’t score a boundary in their last two overs and managed only two in their last six. At the innings break, former RCB captain Faf du Plessis reckoned that the hosts were ten runs short.
The first two overs from Bhuvneshwar Kumar in RCB’s defence was a passage of play straight out of Test-match cricket. With two slips in place, Bhuvneshwar got the new ball to swing both ways and tore through DC’s top order.
He produced the opening breakthrough when he pinged Pathum Nissanka’s pad with a big inswinger in his first over. He then went bang-bang in his second to dismiss Karun Nair and Sameer Rizvi. DC had brought Nair in at No. 3 at his domestic home ground at the expense of a finisher in Ashutosh Sharma, but an outswinger from Bhuvneshwar had Nair carving a catch to deep third for a run-a-ball 5.
Three balls later, Bhuvneshwar had Rizvi caught behind with another outswinger. Jitesh dived full length to his right and pulled off a one-handed screamer, reducing DC to 18 for 3 inside three overs. (ESPNcricinfo)
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