Hardik Pandya-led Gujarat Titans (GT) extended their dominance at the top of the table with a six-wicket win over Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in the Indian Premier League (IPL) on Saturday and inched closer towards clinching a play-off spot in their inception year.
Chasing 171, Rahul Tewatia (43 not out) and David Miller (39 not out) did the job for GT after the table toppers were struggling at 95 for four in the 13th over.
Meanwhile, seasoned Suryakumar Yadav and young Tilak Varma gave the best 35th birthday present to their skipper Rohit Sharma as Mumbai Indians (MI) finally opened their account, beating Rajasthan Royals (RR) by five wickets in the second match of the Saturday's double-header.
Let's have a look at the IPL Points Table after MI-RR and GT-RCB clash:
With 16 points which has been the magic mark, GT are well on course towards a top-two finish at the end of league stage as they consolidated their position on top of the points table. RR, meanwhile, are still second on the table with 12 points, but the gap at the top increased after Saturday's matches.
Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) are third, with 12 points as well, while Sunrisers Hyderabad complete the top four, with 10 points from eight matches.
RCB have now played 10 matches, but only have 10 points and are fifth after three consecutive defeats.
Delhi Capitals are sixth with eight points, while Punjab Kings and Kolkata Knight Riders are seventh and eighth respectively.
Chennai Super Kings are ninth, while Mumbai Indians are still languishing at the bottom of the table, but have finally opened their account with the win on Saturday.
| Teams | Played | Wins | Losses | Points | NRR | |
| GT | 9 | 8 | 1 | 16 | +0.377 | |
| RR | 9 | 6 | 3 | 12 | +0.450 | |
| LSG | 9 | 6 | 3 | 12 | +0.408 | |
| SRH | 8 | 5 | 3 | 10 | +0.600 | |
| RCB | 10 | 5 | 5 | 10 | -0.558 | |
| DC | 8 | 4 | 4 | 8 | +0.695 | |
| PBKS | 9 | 4 | 5 | 8 | -0.470 | |
| KKR | 9 | 3 | 6 | 6 | -0.006 | |
| CSK | 8 | 2 | 6 | 4 | -0.538 | |
| MI | 9 | 1 | 8 | 2 | -0.836 |
Orange Cap
Jos Buttler extended his lead at the top of the run-scorers' charts with his third half-century of the season. He now has 566 runs in nine matches.
KL Rahul is behind him at second place, with 374 runs. Hardik Pandya had a rare failure with the bat, but managed to stay third in the run charts with 308 runs, while MI youngster Tilak Varma is fourth after his impressive knock of 35. Varma and fifth-placed Shikhar Dhawan both have 307 runs to their names so far.
Purple Cap
Rajasthan Royals' Yuzvendra Chahal took just one wicket against MI to take his wicket tally to 19 in a total of nine matches to reign supreme in the Purple Cap list. Following him is Delhi Capitals' Kuldeep Yadav who has snared 17 wicket in eight matches. Sunrisers Hyderabad's pace phenom Umran Malik stormed to third place with 15 scalps in eight matches followed by Royal Challengers' Wanindu Hasaranga and teammate T Natarajan who also have as many wickets as they are placed fourth and fifth in the list respectively.
