Kolkata Knight Riders taken home by Russell after a shaky start - The Kolkata Knight Riders came into action in this tournament after a long break. Today in the 14th match of this season Kings XI Punjab were hosting the defending champions in their new home ground in Pune. KKR lost their previous encounter against Bangalore and were trying to regain the momentum. On the other hand Punjab too were coming after a defeat in the same venue against Delhi. After winning the toss KKR decided to put in Punjab to bat.
Murali Vijay lost his wicket in the very first over as Punjab failed to have a good start. Wriddhiman Saha and Virender Sehwag too didn’t have a good start as Punjab were struggling at 27/3 in 4.2 overs. Saha scored 15 runs while Sehwag scored only 11 runs. Glenn Maxwell and George Bailey were looking dangerous as these two batsmen were hitting the ball fluently. Maxwell scored 33 runs and was looking dangerous when Umesh Yadav struck to take him down. Thisara Perera came into play for the 1st time but was ineffective as he was able to score only 9 runs. the Punjab lower order was failing from one end but from other Bailey continued to hit the ball hard and scored 60 runs in 45 balls. His innings helped the team to post a total of 155 runs. Umesh Yadav was the real star for KKR as he took 3 wickets.
The Kolkata side had a good batting depth and this target was a chasable one in the conditions. Robin Uthappa once again failed in this tournament as he lost his wicket after scoring only 13 runs. Manish Pandey too was ineffective as he scored only 12 runs. KKR were struggling at 34/2. SuryaKumar Yadav and Gautam Gambhir took the team to a score of 60 in 7 overs. It was here when the game changed as Yadav and Gambhir lost their wickets in consecutive overs. Ryan ten Doeschate too didn’t do well as KKR from 60/2 came struggling at 60/5. It was all down to Andre Russell and Yusuf Pathan to take the team home. Russell played a gem of an innings scoring 66 off 33 balls while Pathan scored 28 off 24 balls. With this performance KKR chased down the score in 18 overs.
Andre Russell was named as the man of the match for his marvelous effort with the bat. He also won the yes Bank Maximum sixes award. HotStar of the match award went to Suryakumar Yadav for hitting two sixes to Mitchell Johnson.