Nathan Ellis, an Australian international, stressed the significance of the game in a press conference following the victory. He said that, particularly in light of their recent run of home losses, all of the players competed against Rajasthan out of pride. The 29-year-old continued, calling it a “complete performance” and said that the Punjab players had better adjusted to the circumstances.
The second team to be eliminated from the IPL 2024 playoff race was Punjab Kings (PBKS). Their early elimination was mostly due to the fact that they lost six of their seven home games. Preity Zinta, a co-owner, expressed her disappointment with their performance on home soil as well, saying they cannot contend for the title if they do not routinely win there.
It was a fully realised performance,” remarked Nathan Ellis.
Punjab, on the other hand, has a stellar away record, having won four of their last six games. The team captained by Sam Curran once again turned up a fantastic effort to win the match by five wickets against Rajasthan Royals. Rahul Chahar and Harshal Patel were once again the stars with the ball, and the captain set an example for the others to follow.
Today, we were attempting to give our best performance and playing for pride. We had one of our better games today both on the pitch and with the ball as a team. We bowled in pairs and adjusted to the circumstances.
For PBKS, Sam Curran’s fifty years proved to be sufficient.
With 145 runs to chase, Punjab was in trouble after losing wickets to Rilee Rossouw, Jonny Bairstow, and Prabhsimran Singh. But Sam Curran proved himself, scoring 63* runs off just 41 balls to secure victory for Punjab. Ellis noted that the team was certain that a single 50-run partnership would be sufficient to win, so there was no crisis or fear in the locker room.
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“There was no panic or catastrophe. We’ve always known that all it took to win the game was a single 50-run partnership. Jitesh Sharma and Sam did a great job at that. In particular, Sam allows himself plenty of time, and he executed a very flawless knock today. Jitesh deserves a lot of the praise. He got himself in, set up shop, and gave us some much-needed runs. Just like Sam’s did, his innings helped us over the finish line’, he remarked.