It would have been the highest total in the history of the IPL if it had happened last season, but on Saturday night in Delhi, 266 for 7 almost felt anticlimactic. That’s how far Sunrisers Hyderabad have moved the window of batting possibilities this season. It was the fourth-highest total in IPL history, but it was only the third-highest total achieved by Sunrisers in IPL 2024.

At one point it had felt like they could have finished with so much more, with 300 looking like a frighteningly realistic prospect. Sunrisers had gone where no team in any competition had ever gone before in a T20 powerplay, with Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma raising a hair-raising six-over score of 125 for no loss. Kuldeep Yadav and Axar Patel, fortified by the relaxation of field restrictions, brought Sunrisers’ innings back to the earthly realm thereafter, but that awe-inspiring beginning would remain the defining passage of the match.

Delhi Capitals began their reply by racing to the joint second-highest powerplay score of IPL 2024, but it was only 88 for 2. Jake Fraser-McGurk bettered Head’s 16-ball effort by one ball to bring up the season’s quickest half-century, but his dismissal in the seventh over effectively ended the contest. Capitals had suggested they might run Sunrisers close when they began their chase, but they slumped badly through its back half, against some excellent defensive bowling led by T Natarajan. In the end they were bowled out for a symbolic 199, with Rishabh Pant struggling for fluency before he was last man out for 44 off 35 balls.