While there were no changes at the top of the Purple Cap leaderboard on Wednesday, the Orange Cap changed heads.
Virat Kohli moved up to the top of the run-scorers’ table and earned the Orange Cap after his 49 off 34 balls against Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) helped Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB) chase 147 at the Chinnaswamy Stadium. After coming in as an Impact Player for the first time in the IPL, Kohli top-scored for RCB and extended his tally in this season to 228. Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) wicketkeeper-batter Heinrich Klaasen is currently second on the list, with 224 runs.
This was the first time in Kohli’s career that RCB had used him as their Impact Player. He had not been part of RCB’s starting XI when they opted to bowl first, and he had been off the field during their last match as well, against Mumbai Indians (MI) on Sunday. Kohli said he had experienced soreness in his knee during that game, and had not been in the best of health in the lead-up to Wednesday’s match either.
Rajat Patidar, the RCB captain, meanwhile moved up to third after hitting 27 off 13 balls against LSG on Wednesday. Apart from Kohli, Klaasen and Patidar, Ishan Kishan and Vaibhav Sooryavanshi are the only other batters with more than 200 runs this season.
Chennai Super Kings seamer Anshul Kamboj stays on top alongside Gujarat Titans’ Prasidh Krishna with ten wickets. Rajasthan Royals wristspinner Ravi Bishnoi and LSG seamer Prince Yadav are hot on their heels with nine strikes. Behind them are Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Krunal Pandya who now have seven wickets each after five games.
Krunal is the only fingerspinner in the top-ten wicket-takers so far this season.
