Sanju Samson’s brilliant 92 set up a Rajasthan total of 217 which Virat Kohli’s Royal Challengers just could not match.
Samson smashed 10 sixes and two fours among the 45 balls he faced, ending unbeaten, with support from Ajinkya Rahane (36 off 20), Ben Stokes (27 off 21), Jos Buttler (23 off 14) and a little closing cameo of 14 off five balls from Rahul Tripathi.
Faced with an RRR of almost 11 an over, the Challengers seemed to be on track when they were 81-1 after eight overs, having lost Brendon McCullum early. Quinton de Kock (26) and Kohli put on 77 when De Kock pulled a half-tracker from D’Arcy Short to deep backward square leg.
Even so, the Challengers still had their big-hitters Kohli and AB de Villiers, hero of the win on Friday night with 57 off 40, but local leg-break bowler Shreyas Gopal took out both in successive overs, and both were on the pull. Kohli was just getting going on 57 off 30 balls, while De Villiers was yet to get out of second gear on 20 off 18.
All of a sudden, the Challengers had lost three top batsmen for 33 runs. Mandeep Singh tried to pick up the pace with 45 off 25, and Washington Sundar went on the rampage for 35 off 19, but it too little too late.
Royal Challengers fell to sixth on the log, while the Rajasthan Royals climbed to third.
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