Knight Riders made a mark before ending their DLF IPL stint for this year. Ganguly and Gul’s combined firepower managed to stop the winning streak of Kings XI Punjab at Eden Gardens , Kolkata.
An exceptional thrilling game with both sides playing for different objectives. Kings XI Punjab with already their berth secured for the semi-finals played the game with an aim to dislodge Rajasthan Royals from the top slot and also to reinforce the overwhelming confidence. While the Knight Riders played the game to make a statement and regain their professional pride much of which was lost during the tournament with losses and a dismal batting performance.
Ganguly scored a superb knock of 86 out of 53 balls with six boundaries and equal no of over boundaries.While Umar Gul scored 24 out of 11 balls with one four and three sixes to make a record total in this field. Umar Gul also bagged the Man of the Match award for taking 4 wickets for 23 runs.
Earlier Yuvraj won the toss and decided to bat and summed up a total of 174 for 9 - which was good enough given the slow pitch. However Gul restricted the last over with two wickets and kept a check on the total also.
Kolkata seemed to be out of the game with almost 15 runs per over required in the last 5 overs. That was before Ganguly and Gul got together, putting on 49 runs in 18 balls. With 15 required off the last over, Ganguly was equal to the task, wrapping up the match with 2 balls to spare, reminiscent of how Warne did it for his team against the Deccan Chargers. Overall a great match where the game turned with every over during the end.
Seasonal Nor-wester Storms disrupted DLF IPL match between Kolkata Knight Riders and Chennai Super Kings and once again Duckworth Lewis method was used which awarded the win to Chennai on the basis of run rate.
Knight Riders started off badly with the loss of Salmun Butt, Hafeez, Ganguly and Hussey - the major bats but managed a moderate score of 145 for the loss of 5 wickets.
Chennai opened with a firm stand between Parthiv Patel and Stephen Fleming who played steadily given the low target.
Chennai managed to maintain there league position while Knight Riders slipped into further uncertainty. Ntini bagged the MOM award for his superb spell of 4 for 21 with a hat-trick in which he bagged Hafeez, Ganguly, Das and David Hussey - all important wickets.
In the other match Mumbai Indians continued their dream run with a straight win against Deccan Chargers who once gain failed to make it in their home ground. However, R P Singh got the purple cap while Dwayne Bravo who leaves shortly bagged the man of the match award with 3/24.
Sahid Afridi once again failed to make any mark with his bat while it was not a lucky day for Gilchrist and Sachin and the crowd missed fireworks badly except for a momentary blasting by Sanath Jayasuriya.
There will be long debates across the coffee houses in Kolkata and the Barista’s in Mumbai on whether it was great bowling, or over confidence or a bad pitch which led to the miserable defeat of Knight Riders with the lowest total ever scored in 20Twenty Cricket. And this comes after a dream run of three straight wins.
This is not only the quickest win in this IPL. To make things even better for the Mumbai Indians, this is also a World Record for the fastest Twenty20 win ever!
Mumbai climb up to the 4th spot in the points table now, they topple Kolkata and leave behind Delhi too with one game less and better net run-rate!
This is Mumbai’s fifth straight win in this tournament, they equal with Kolkata and Delhi in the points table now but occupies the forth position due to their run-rate. While Kolkata gets displaced to the 6th position just ahead of Deccan Chargers and Bangalore Royal Challengers.
Inspite of Sachin getting out for zero, Jayasuriya continued his flamboyance from where he left in the last match. Earlier Shaun Pollock plucked the vital wickets of David Hussey, Hafeez and Salman Butt and the Knight Riders managed a total of just 67 losing all their wickets. Mumbai Indians - the ‘men in blue’ met the target in just 5.3 overs won by 8 wickets with Shaun grabbing the Man of the Match.
Deccan Chargers v Kolkata Knight Riders at Hyderabad
Last time these two teams met, the pitch didn’t set up a happy background but the struggle was superb. The pitch at Hyderabad is likely to be batting friendly. Expect Chargers to come out with revenge on their minds.
Men at the Helm
Ganguly inspired his boys to victory in the last game against Bangalore with a man of the match performance and that too for his bowling. Gilchrist has led the side well in Laxman’s absence but the side is sorely missing his batting.
We have the bat
Batting of both these teams hasn’t been very good. Its only Rohit and Gilchrist, who have clicked for Deccan and even they haven’t fired together. For Kolkata, only David Hussey has looked convincing. But Taibu showed glimpses in the last match.
We have the ball
Knight Riders’ bowling is much stronger than Deccan which they proved in the last match against Bangalore too. Ishant has been phenomenal. Ojha has taken wickets for Chargers but been costly. They dearly want RP Singh to strike big
Patrolling Party
Barring two or three in each side both are average fielding units. But Kolkata were an inspired lot in the field in the last match and Taibu was a revelation.
High on betting meter
This is the reason why nobody dares to speak against this team called Deccan Chargers winning. Even loss after loss they are still higher on betting meter.
Who gets the tick?
Kolkata put in a great performance in the last match but its time for Gilly, Rohit, Gibbs and Styris to write their own script this time.
Karachi : Sohaib Akhtar has finally cleared all hurdles and now he can take part in IPL. Earlier the Pak board has enforced a ban of five years on him which prevented him from playing IPL as the rules et in by the IPL governing body states clearly that no player can take part unless he gets a NOC from his home country Cricket Board.
Earlier Shoaib lost his appeal against the ban after which he appealed to the Pak Cricket Board to allow him top play for IPL which was heard yesterday. The Pak board was lenient and has been kind enough to kept his suspension in abeyance for a period of one month - which perfectly allows him to play for the Kolkata Knight Riders the IPL team for which he has signed initially.
The news was cheered by the owner of the Kolkata Team - Shahrukh Khan as also the team mates who are currently in dire need of a miracle to push them up from the very end of the team position table in the tournament. With Ishant Sharma bowling at his peak with Knight Riders , Sohaib’s inclusion definitely adds a fire power to the team but with the top batting order failing on each of the last three instances one has a doubt if Sohaib’s inclusion will really make a major difference to the performance.
