Shreyas Iyer played a blinder of an innings (93 not out off 40 balls) against Kolkata to help Delhi post the highest total (219/4) of IPL 2018 on Friday.
No.3 Iyer, who was made captain of the side earlier this week after Gautam Gambhir decided to leave the DD captaincy, joined Prithvi Shaw with 59 runs on the board in seven overs.
Delhi scored a whopping 76 runs in the last four overs and 49 of those came off the bat of Iyer, who in all hit three fours and 10 sixes.
Shivam Mavi bore the brunt of the Iyer assault as he conceded 29 runs in the last over of the innings, highest by any bowler this season.
This was Iyer's third successive fifty this season. The 23-year-old also became the fourth player to score a fifty on captaincy debut, joining the likes of Aaron Finch, Murali Vijay and Adam Gilchrist.
Earlier in the day, playing only his second IPL game, Shaw scored his maiden fifty and became the joint-youngest player to do so in the history of the league. Shaw reached his fifty in 37 balls against KKR and proved why many consider him 'one for the future'.
Shaw eventually fell for a 44-ball 62. He hit seven fours and two sixes during his stay at the crease. Here is the list of the top-6 youngest players to score an IPL fifty.
18 years 169 days Prithvi Shaw
18 years 169 days S Samson (2013)
18 years 212 days R Pant (2016)
18 years 299 days I Kishan (2017)
19 years 001 days S Goswami (2008)
19 years 253 days M Pandey (2009)
At the Ferozshah Kotla Stadium after being put into bat, the Delhi openers added 59 runs to record the team's highest opening stand in IPL 2018.
Colin Munro and Shaw batted with great conviction and flair to get the team off to a flier.
12 (against KXIP), 0 (against RR), 50 (against MI), 4 (against KKR), 7 (against RCB) and 25 (against KXIP) were Delhi's opening returns in their previous six matches. The partnership ended off the last ball of the seventh over when Kiwi Munro, only player in world cricket to score three T20I tons, was cleaned up by fast bowler Mavi against the run of play.
Munro departed for 33 and hit four fours and two sixes during his 18-ball stay.
