Rajasthan Royals beat Kolkata Knight Riders on a Boundary count in a sensational match at Sheikh Zayed Stadium, Abu Dhabi. The match ended as a tie and even the super-over wasn’t able to decide the winning team, and finally RR won the match they scored more number of boundaries than the KKR team.
Shane Watson won the toss and opted to bat first. It was a strange decision as it was quite likely that dew would play a vital role in this stadium. Rajasthan didn’t get the start they wanted as they lost their opener Karun Nair early in the hands of Vinay Kumar. Rahane (72 runs, 59 balls) and Sanju Samson (20 runs, 19 balls) made a partnership but they were unable to accelerate the run rate due to smart piece of bowling. After the first 10 overs Rajasthan Royals were at 57/2.
Shane Watson (33 runs, 24 balls) kept his cool and played quite well along with the well-settled Ajinkya Rahane, who claimed his 12th IPL 50 in this game. Stuart Binny failed as he got out on golden duck but the Australian Steve Smith hit some good shots and made a quick-fire 19 from 11 balls. Eventually Rajasthan could only make 152/5 from 20 overs. Vinay Kumar took 2 wickets, while Morne Morkel and Shakib al Hasan managed to claim only 1 wicket each for KKR team.
While chasing this total Kolkata didn’t get a flying start as Bisla (3 runs, 9 balls) dismissed early in the innings. However, the skipper Gautam Gambhir (45 runs, 44 balls) did get some sort of his form back in this match. Kallis (13 runs, 17 balls) got luck on his side as Shane Watson bowled a No Ball when he was caught behind on 1. But eventually the veteran Pravin Tambe got the wicket of Kallis. After the first 10 overs KKR were at 59/2. Surya Kumar Yadav played an awesome innings of 31 runs from just 19 balls, and at the end the overseas player Shakib al Hasan (29 runs, 18 balls) made sure that KKR tied the game from the limited 20 overs. Finally KKR was able to make 152/8 exactly the same number of runs as the
Rajasthan Royals team. James Faulkner bowled beautifully and took 3 major wickets on a single over to bring his team right back into the game.
1st IPL 2014 Super Over
In the Super Over, Kolkata Knight Riders batsman Suryakumar Yadav and Shakib Al Hasan came onto the ground to bat. On the other hand, James Faulkner took the ball for Rajasthan Royals. SuryaKumar Yadav lost his wicket on the first ball of Faulkner. He tried to take the 2 runs and was run-out while trying for the second run. Then Manish Pandey came to join Shakib Al Hasan and took a single from the 2nd ball of Faulkner. Again, it was a single run on the next ball. Kolkata Knight Riders were at the score of 3 runs from 3 balls. On the fourth ball, Manish Pandey went for the maximum and then again a single run on the next ball. Now, on the final ball, Shakib Al Hasan lost his wicket while trying to take 2 runs. In this way, KKR made 11 runs and set a target of 12 runs for the Rajasthan Royals.
For Rajasthan Royals, Shane Watson and Steven Smith were sent to achieve the target. The ball was handed over to Narine. On the first ball, Watson played to the long-off for a single, and then Steven Smith took a double on the deep mid-wicket from the next ball of Narine. Now, there was again a single run on the 3rd ball but after that, Shame Watson struck a boundary on the mid-wicket field for Rajasthan Royals.
Now, RR needed 4 runs from 2 balls. Then, a fine delivery of Narine gave just a single run and now needed 3 runs from the last ball. Steven Smith was on the strike and played it very well towards extra cover for 2 runs off the last ball. In this way, the super over was also tied and Rajasthan Royals was declared the winner because they struck more boundaries than Kolkata Knight Riders. The Man of the Match title was given to James Faulkner for his superb performance with the ball in the match. He was very economical with the ball and took 3 wickets in his 2 overs.