Kolkata Knight Riders begin their campaign in style: Two times champions, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) began their campaign in a style. They successfully chased a relatively stiff target of 184 runs set by Gujarat Lions (GL) without losing a wicket in the match played at Rajkot.
Put into bat, GL lost both their openers, Jason Roy (14) and Brendon McCullum (35) in 8.1 overs with only 72 runs on the board.
Skipper Suresh Raina and Andrew Finch added another 20 runs before Finch fell for his individual score of 15 runs in the 11th over.
Dinesh Karthik, who joined Raina in the middle, took off from where he left in the Deodhar Trophy, in which he single-handedly helped his team Tamil Nadu, win the title. Earlier he had also played a stellar role in helping Tamil Nadu win the Vijay Hazare Trophy.
Both Raina and Karthik stayed together till the pen-ultimate delivery of the innings and 87 runs for the fourth-wicket.
GL ended their quota of 20 overs with 183 runs for the loss of 4 wickets, wuth Raina remaining unbeaten on 68 runs made off just 51 deliveries studded with 7 fours at 133.33 strike rate.
For KKR, the young Kuldeep Yadav, who had a very memorable Test debut, a few days ago, playing against Australia and bagged 4 good wickets in their first innings, was the most successful bowler, picking up 2 wickets Of the four that fell), giving away 25 runs in his 4-over spell.
Chasing 184 runs for a win, KKR did not have to bat ‘deep down’ since their openers made “short-work” of the GL bowling and achieved the target in just 14.5 overs.
Chris Lynn who joined his skipper, Gautam Gambhir to open the innings, literally tore the ‘feeble’ GL bowling attack and went on a ‘run-spree’. He scored at a strike rate of 226.82, facing just 41 deliveries for his 93* runs (unbeaten) that included 6 fours and 8 huge sixes.
Gambhir, on his part, playing a second fiddle, notched up an unbeaten 76* runs off 48 deliveries with the help of 12 hits to the fence at 158.33 strike rate.
The unbeaten partnership of 184* runs for the first-wicket is a record for IPL and a world record in T20 format of the game.
Raina used as many as 6 bowlers but failed to unsettle the KKR opening pair.
For his heroics, Lynn was awarded the Player of the Match award.
Speaking at the post-match presentation, Lynn said, “To hit the ball a long way is my role. Touch-wood and I enjoy the role. At the end of the day, it is about preparation. I like the spot at the top, the ball is coming on. I am used to ball ‘coming on’ at home. Gauti is such a good player of spin, I can turn the strike to him and I can handle the quicks. One good innings does not make a summer.”
In a couple of days, KKR take on Mumbai Indians (MI) at Mumbai.
