IPL ton helps Sanju get over poor season
Rahul Dravid would be a happy man on Tuesday. Sanju Samson, who he has kept backing to be part of the Delhi Daredevils squad for the last two seasons despite not so extraordinary performances, came out in flying colours.
Sanju Samson on Tuesday became IPL 10’s first centurion. And thanks to that, IPL 10 also has its first innings score of above 200.
Sanju Samson had a poor Ranji Trophy season for Kerala. Forget the fact that he was dropped midway for ‘indiscipline’ and then for a knee injury. He had a total of 334 runs in seven matches of which there was one innings of 154.
BAD START
Delhi Daredevils had lost their first wicket — Aditya Tare was out in the second over of the match with Daredevils on 2. Samson came and began to smash it around the park right from the word go. His century came off 62 balls with eight fours and five sixes.
The 22-year-old wicket-keeper batsman was dismissed for a paltry 13 against Royal Challengers Bangalore in the previous game. On Tuesday, he took on the Supergiant attack as Sam Billings settled down at the other end.
The boundaries did dry up at the end of the powerplay session with a vividly upset Stephen Fleming addressing the team during the strategic time-out but Samson kept rotating the strike to keep the scoreboard going.
With Billings gone in the ninth over, Samson paired with Pant to rebuild the innings for Delhi.
After completing his fifty, he lofted Adam Zampa for his first six in the 15th over and got back to the momentum with which he had started the knock. He took 19 off Ashok Dinda’s third over, including two gigantic sixes and a boundary, before lofting Zampa for the maximum in the next over to bring up his century.