Synopsis: Sooryavanshi’s backlift and Jurel’s finish light up Jaipur as RR stay alive; LSG’s 220 never enough despite Marsh’s 96 and Inglis’s 60, Punja’s googly the turning point
Vaibhav Sooryavanshi made 93 off 38 balls and Dhruv Jurel finished what he started, as Rajasthan Royals beat Lucknow Super Giants by seven wickets in Jaipur on Tuesday, moving to fourth on the points table and keeping their qualification hopes alive in a season that had threatened to end weeks ago.
The backlift
Sooryavanshi was 13 when Zubin Bharucha first asked him whose fan he was. The answer came without hesitation – Brian Lara. Not MS Dhoni, not Virat Kohli. A boy in Bihar, growing up after Lara’s career had ended, had settled on the left-hander from Trinidad as his template. Bharucha noticed the walking gait first, then the way the bat was held. By the time the boy lifted his bat to play his first ball, Bharucha was smiling. The backlift – past vertical, wrists snapping it back even further, almost 180 degrees – had arrived fully formed.
On Tuesday, Mohsin Khan got the first over. Sooryavanshi left three, defended one, dabbed a single. Then Mayank Yadav arrived at 148kph, short and outside off. Sooryavanshi leaned back, lofted, and held his pose as the ball cleared deep extra-cover. That pose – bat finishing high, body still, ball already gone – is what happens when the sequencing arrives. Bharucha has said that when it all comes together, the ball doesn’t need to be persuaded. It simply goes.
Vaibhav Suryavanshi of Rajasthan Royals play a shot during Match 64 of the TATA Indian Premier League 2026. (Photo by Arjun Singh / CREIMAS for IPL)
By the eighth over, it had gone many times. Akash Singh conceded 26 in a single over – a pull over deep midwicket, a slash through third man, a heave through mid-wicket. Rishabh Pant walked across mid-over to speak to his bowler. The next ball went for four anyway. Yashasvi Jaiswal fell for 43 at the other end, caught at the boundary, and barely interrupted the evening.
Sooryavanshi’s fifty came in the ninth over, a reverse-sweep off Digvesh Rathi’s googly. Sooryavanshi raised his fingers – an inverted V with one across it. Something private, unexplained. Four more sixes followed across overs 10 and 11. Over 12, Digvesh dragged short and wide, it was flat-batted before the fielders moved.
With Royals needing 41 off 38 at the start of the 14th over, the chase was done. Mohsin came back. Slower ball, outside off. Sooryavanshi cleared his front leg for the hoick – but the slowness did exactly what it was meant to do. Hit high on the bat, lobbed to long-on. Abdul Samad held it.
Ninety-three off 38. Ten sixes, seven fours. He is fifteen, batting at a strike rate no one in IPL history has matched across a full season, with 53 sixes – only Gayle in 2012 has hit more in a single edition.
Inglis, Marsh and the hands
LSG batted first. Josh Inglis knew where to look – at his own hands. During his stint with Punjab Kings under Ricky Ponting, he shifted his stance so his hands sat further from his body, giving him room to swing through the line of the ball. “Now I feel like my hands are out here a bit more,” he said once.
Jofra Archer, Royals’ sharpest Powerplay weapon all season, found out first. Mitchell Marsh charged and slapped him over mid-off for six in the opening over. Inglis followed – a 99-metre heave over deep backward square leg off Sushant Mishra’s second ball. LSG were 83/0 at the end of the Powerplay. Inglis reached 50 off 22 balls. Marsh followed off 33. The stand was 105 when Yashraj Punja arrived.
The googly
In the narrow corridor of the Punja home, where the house rule permitted only spin, the younger one’s leg-breaks kept coming out as wrong ‘uns. Then came the height – 6 foot 5 – and a chance encounter at a Bengaluru academy where Bharucha happened to be watching nets.
Punja was the only Royals bowler who made the batsmen think. In the ninth over, he tossed one up around leg stump, Inglis went low to slog-sweep, missed, and the middle stump was disturbed. Nicholas Pooran followed 11 balls later. Four overs, 35 for 2 on a batting belter – Punja finished with an economy rate of 8.75.
The last 12 overs
Marsh finished on 96. Jaiswal, running from long-on, caught him short with a precise throw to the wicketkeeper. Eleven fours, five sixes, 57 balls – the innings had earned its hundred by every measure except the one that counts. Pant made 35 off 23 and LSG managed only 115 runs after the Powerplay. That perhaps was the difference.
Dhruv Jurel of Rajasthan Royals play a shot during Match 64. (Photo by Arjun Singh / CREIMAS for IPL)
Jurel finishes it
When Sooryavanshi fell, Royals needed 41 off 38. Jurel took it from there – two sixes off Mayank in the 11th over, a fifty off 38 balls, then Ferreira’s six over long-off off the first ball of the 20th. Victory with five balls to spare.
Brief scores: LSG 220/5 in 20 overs (Marsh 96, Inglis 60; Punja 2/35) lost to RR 225/3 in 19.1 overs (Sooryavanshi 93, Jurel 53*; Mohsin 1/31) by 7 wickets
