Delhi falters despite Chris Morris' all-round heroics

Despite Chris Morris' all-round heroics, Gujarat narrowly beat Delhi by one run in their Indian Twenty20 competition encounter in Delhi on Wednesday.

Gujarat's openers, Brendon McCullum and Dwayne Smith, dictated terms from the start and recorded the fastest hundred of the season after Zaheer Khan won the toss and opted to bowl first. Imran Tahir broke the 112-run opening stand by dismissing Smith for a 30-ball 53 in the 11th over.

Smith' dismissal sparked a collapse, as Morris dismissed McCullum, an over later, for a 36-ball 60. Gujarat's powerful middle order, comprising of Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja and Dinesh Karthik, failed to maintain the early momentum and managed just 25 runs between them. Morris had the dangerous Raina cleverly caught at short fine leg for just two.

Tahir was the pick of Delhi's bowlers with figures of three for 24, while Morris claimed two for 35 to restrict Gujarat to just 172 in their innings. Delhi needed a steady start in their bid to register their fourth win of the season, but they were reduced to three for 16 in the first four overs.

JP Duminy and Rishabh Pant the provided some stability and added 41 runs for the fourth wicket, before Pant fell in the 11th over for 20. Delhi at that stage required 116 runs off 56 balls to win. Morris quickly changed that equation and thumped six sixes and a four to register the third fastest 50, in the competition, from just 17 balls.

Morris' first two sixes reduced the deficit from 101 off 48 to 85 off 42. Two against Tambe in the 15th reduced it further to 57 off 30 and three sixes in the 17th over, bowled by Dwayne Smith, left Daredevils with 29 to get off 18. Delhi required 14 runs of the last over after Praveen Kumar's penultimate over went for just four runs. Bravo, bowling from around the stumps, then hit the blockhole repeatedly to deny Morris and Delhi a win.

"Upset we couldn't get there, but happy that I could contribute. I was quite lucky, it was one of those nights where I timed and it flew off the middle of the bat," Morris said. "It's been a lot of practice on my batting over the last couple of months. I asked Rahul when I came in, he said just have a go. You want to be winning tight games like that, unfortunately we were on he wrong side tonight. This was definitely one of the best T20 games I've been involved in."