Tewatia left inconsolable, Ponting's wild celebration: How Ishant scripted DC's unthinkable last-over win against GT

Ishant Sharma, who has often been written off as a T20 bowler, held his nerves to dismiss Tewatia and defend 11 runs in the final over to guide DC to a win.

Nick Knight had called it a "pretty flat and good surface" with "180-190" a winning score. Who would have known that the Ahmedabad track would have shown a different face. Delhi Capitals, at one stage in the game, were left wounded for 23 for 5 before huffing and puffing their way to 130 against Gujarat Titans. It looked like the defending champions had a win sealed for them, but they were wrong as were most, if not all. They incurred a similar start before skipper Hardik Pandya and Abhinav Manohar revived the innings, but failed to up the ante.

How Ishant Sharma scripted DC's unthinkable win after Tewatia's hat-trick of 6s

Just when Delhi were left certain of a win, Rahul Tewatia did what he does best - smoked three straight sixes off Anirch Nortje. But unlike the usual script for him, he failed to finish it off and there emerged a new hero. Ishant Sharma, who has often been written off as a T20 bowler, held his nerves to dismiss Tewatia and defend 11 runs in the final over to guide DC to an unthinkable win.

Delhi were the firm favourites when Gujarat needed 33 runs off the last 12 balls. The narrative in the match favoured Delhi, but they were up against a team that once chased 12 off 2 and the man who had pulled it off was still in the middle.

Nortje has earned the reputation of a death-overs specialist. In one of the matches for Delhi this season, he showed exemplary bowling with the old ball and nailed pin-point yorkers. The strategy remained the same on Tuesday. Hardik managed only three runs in the first three balls before giving the strike back to Tewatia and that paid off for Gujarat.

The iceman smacked the fourth ball, a low full toss, over deep square leg for the first six, then slammed the yorker over long-on for a second six and in the final delivery, a yorker again, Tewatia shuffled and slogged it over cow corner for a third consecutive maximum.

The Ahmedabad crowd was live once again. There was hope for GT. The equation was down to 12 off 6. But whom did Delhi turn to? An experienced Ishant.

Hardik scored three runs off the first two balls and put Tewatia on strike, but this time it did not pay off well for GT. Ishant finally managed what Nortje failed to do in the previous yorker - a wide yorker - and it was a dot ball. Ishant went wide again, but cleverly dished out a length ball and took the pace off it. Tewatia shuffled across, looked to slam it over mid-off, but got no timing whatsoever and was found by the fielder.

Rashid Khan too has shown his ability to finish off games with sixes off his trademark snake shot, but Ishant denied not more than three runs in the last two balls as DC won by five runs. It was an unthinkable win on many margins, but the target set by them, second their horror of a season so far and third going up against the defending champions and table toppers of the present season. Well, Ricky Ponting's crazy celebrations summed it up for Delhi as he burst out of his seat to hug his teammates while Tewatia was left inconsolable.

"I played enough cricket with him (Tewatia), so was just having fun with him. I knew I had to double bluff him otherwise we know what he can do with the bat," Ishant later spilled the beans on his plans for Tewatia in the last over.