Punjab stay in hunt for play-offs

Kings XI Punjab strengthened their playoffs chance beating Delhi Daredevils by 7 runs in their IPL clash at the HPCA stadium on Thursday.A After posting a massive 171/4, Punjab restricted Daredevils to 164/7 , pulling off an impressivevictory. Delhi Daredevils looked out of sync right from the start of their innings as they lost Unmukt Chand, Irfan Pathan and David Warner with just 12 runs on board. Praveen Kumar bowled out Unmukt Chand (7) to give Delhi first blow. Sandeep Sharma capitalised on the breakthrough provided by Praveen and dismissed Pathan and Warner in consecutive deliveries to reduce Delhi to 12/3 in four overs. Kings XI Punjab rode on David Miller and captain Adam Gilchrist's whirlwind knocks to post a challenging 171 for four.

Miller scored an unbeaten 44 off just 24 balls towards the end, while Gilchrist made 42 off 26 balls upfront. Shaun Marsh also played a sedate 44-ball 45-run knock to help Kings XI's cause. Sent into bat, Gilchrist got Kings XI off to a blazing start racing the hosts to the 50-run mark in the sixth over. Gilchrist sent the Delhi bowlers on a leather hunt from the word go. Brief Scores: KXIP 171 for four (Shaun Marsh 45, David Miller 44no, Adam Gilchrist 42, Ashish Nehra 2/38) bt DD 164 for seven (Ben Rohrer 49, Mahela Jayawardene 39, Sandeep Sharma 3/23). Man of the Match: David Miller