IPL 2021: Watch - Punjab Kings Pacer Arshdeep Singh Dazzles Against RR With A Five-Wicket Haul

Punjab Kings (PBKS) quick bowler Arshdeep Singh earned his maiden five-wicket haul in the IPL during the match against Rajasthan Royals (RR) on Tuesday. He snared the wickets of Evin Lewis, Liam Livingstone, Mahipal Lomror, Chetan Sakariya, and Kartik Tyagi.

Arshdeep put on a skillful bowling show on a pitch that barely offered anything to the bowlers. He displayed his repertoire of slower deliveries and pacy yorkers to bamboozle the RR batsmen.

The 22-year-old was used extremely well by PBKS skipper, KL Rahul. He was brought in during the powerplay to provide a breakthrough. He dismissed the dangerous-looking Evin Lewis in the sixth over of the innings just when the West Indian was set to tee off.

He later came back to get an even bigger wicket, that of in-form English batsman, Liam Livingstone. The final three wickets came in the death overs with the RR side in a good position. Arshdeep completed the fifer when he took two wickets off the last two balls of the innings.

The left-armer’s figures of 5/32 was the fourth-best by an uncapped Indian player behind Ankit Rajpoot’s 5/14, Varun Chakravarthy’s 5/20, Harshal Patel’s 5/27 against MI in the first phase of IPL 2021. Arshdeep also became the third-youngest to take five wickets in a match after Jaydev Unadkat (in 2013) and Alzarri Joseph (in 2019).

Earlier, Rahul’s decision to bowl first looked dubious with the RR openers setting the tempo. Wickets kept falling at regular intervals but each batsman walking in came with the intent to maintain the run rate. The positive attitude kept rubbing onto the next player.

The stage was set for the batsmen to go for the kill in the death overs but RR fumbled. They lost their last six wickets for just 19 runs, eventually folding up for 185 in their allotted 20 overs.

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Watch Arshdeep Singh’s five-wicket haul here: