Lucknow, April 27

Sanju Samson's unbeaten half-century had five times more impact compared to Rahul's relatively sedate 48-ball 76 as Rajasthan Royals took a giant step towards the IPL playoffs as they beat Lucknow Super Giants by seven wickets here today.

While Rahul is the odds-on favourite to be chosen as the second wicketkeeper after Rishabh Pant for the T20 World Cup, Samson kept himself in the reckoning too with an unbeaten 71 off 33 balls. He hit four classy sixes, including the winning one in a chase of 197.

Samson and Jurel came together after RR had stumbled from a brisk start to hand the advantage to the home side, putting on a robust stand of 121 runs in 62 balls for the unconquered fourth wicket to take their side over the line.

The win took RR to 16 points — six clear off Kolkata Knight Riders — and a step closer to becoming the first team to reach the playoffs. The playoffs cut-off this year is likely to be 18 points.

Earlier, Rahul and Deepak Hooda gave LSG a solid footing with a 62-ball 115-run stand for the third wicket after early blows, but the hosts could not capitalise on the duo's hard work. — PTI

CSK look to pile misery on SRH

Chennai: Smarting from back-to-back losses, defending champions Chennai Super Kings will be desperate to return to winning ways when they face a bruised Sunrisers Hyderabad in their IPL match here tomorrow. SRH are coming into the game following a failure of their ultra-aggressive batting approach against Royal Challengers Bengaluru. While dew played a heavy factor in CSK's last home fixture, SRH's strategic coach Muttiah Muralitharan feels another high-scoring contest is on the cards.

"It's going to be a high-scoring contest because the game has changed and scores over 200 being chased. The coaches and players are also using the impact player rule very well," he reckoned today.