Strong bowling, Marsh, Warner keep Capitals in mid-table joust
They continue to be fifth on the table, just behind Rajasthan Royals and Royal Challengers Bangalore
Jos Buttler has carried the batting for Royals, a side with a short batting line-up and only one toss won in 12 matches, but he was stifled and then taken out for his lowest score this season and his earliest dismissal. Chetan Sakariya, coming in for the injured Khaleel Ahmed, didn't give him anything to hit away, and when he saw a full ball finally - the fifth of the third over - all he managed was a hit straight to mid-on. Gone for 7 off 11.
Seeing there was something in the pitch, Royals promoted Ashwin to No. 3 presumably in a bid to use the powerplay overs without necessarily risking a more indispensable - and limited - batting resource, especially with Shimron Hetmyer missing. Ashwin might have got stuck twice, but on both occasions he came out of the situation. First he responded to a run-a-ball start by hitting Axar Patel for a six and a four in the sixth over. Then he went after Kuldeep Yadav and Sakaria later in the innings to get to a fifty.
Anrich Nortje and Sakariya, though, bowled two excellent overs at the death to take out Samson and Parag. Samson got too far under the hard length from Nortje, and Parag fell to the back-of-the-hand slower ball from Sakariya. It was in fact Devdutt Padikkal, batting in the unusual No. 4 position, who kept Royals in the game with his 48 off 30, but when Nortje got him out at the start of the 19th, all of Royals' measures to prolong their batting were defeated. Rassie van der dussen and Trent Boult faced the last two overs, and managed just 14.
Royals needed a good start if they were to entertain defending, and they nearly had the perfect one. Boult removed KS Bharat second ball, Prasidh Krishna followed it up with his third maiden of this IPL, and then Boult had a close lbw shout against Marsh turned down. Samson and Boult felt Marsh might have hit it, but replays showed he hadn't.
Having been reprieved there, Marsh went on to his reprise knock in the T20 World Cup final last year. He backed himself and didn't make much of a four-off-12 start - some of the most difficult bowling Marsh said he has faced in T20 cricket - before he launched into his first six, over extra cover off an Ashwin carrom ball. He picked on Kuldeep Sen with two straight sixes in the seventh over. Warner was still only 12 off 12, but Marsh had raced away to 39 off 28.
Sidharth Monga is an assistant editor at ESPNcricinfo