CHENNAI: Chasing 175 to win against Kolkata Knight Riders, Rajasthan Royals just crumbled to 137/9 as their mentor Shane Warne looked on.
KKR neutralised Smith (3) and Samson (8) early on while Buttler only made a sedate 21.
With all their dangermen back in the dugout, and no sight of Stokes yet, the rest hardly put up a fight except Tom Curran who scored an unbeaten fifty. But his single-handed fightback was not enough for them.
KKR meanwhile were impressive in all the departments as they put Royals to the sword and get their second straight win.
There were always going to be questions on how Rajasthan Royals would hold up in case their top-order batsmen failed to fire.
Their two wins out of two were largely down to the consistency of Steve Smith and Sanju Samson. And the middle-order, without a certain Ben Stokes in it, was going to be put to test at some stage.
That acid test came on Wednesday against the Pat Cummins led bowling unit of Kolkata Knight Riders at the Dubai International Stadium.
In the first innings, Jofra Archer was impressive with the ball for Royals with some fiery bowling, but thanks to the efforts of Shubman Gill (47) and Eoin Morgan (34), KKR reached a good total of 174/6. In the end, they managed to defend it quite comfortably.
What would be more heartening for them would be the performances of Shivam Mavi, Varun Chakravarthy and Kamlesh Nagarkoti - all of whom ably supported Cummins in a thoroughly dominating bowling display.