IPL 2017 | KKR advance in rain delayed Eliminator in Bengaluru

05/18/2017

KKR made light work of the revised target of 48 after a brilliant 19-ball 32 by Gautam Gambhir powered Kolkata to 7 wicket victory over Hyderabad in the eliminator. Earlier, Sunrisers had managed 128/7 in their 20 overs before a near three hour rain delay meant that the target was reset for KKR.

Brief Scores: Sunrisers Hyderabad 128/7 (David Warner 37; Kane Williamson 24; Nathan Coulter-Nile 3/20, Umesh Yadav 2/21) lost to Kolkata Knight Riders 48/3 (Gautam Gambhir 32*, Chris Lynn 6; Bhuvneshwar Kumar 1/11, Chris Lynn 1/9) by 7 wickets (D/L).

Gautam Gambhir won the toss for Kolkata and put Hyderabad into bat. Both teams made a host of changes with Suryakumar Yadav, Piyush Chawla, Ishank Jaggi, and Nathan Coulter-Nile coming in for the Knight Riders, while Chris Jordan, Kane Williamson, Yuvraj Singh, and Bipul Sharma came in for the Sunrisers.

Hyderabad fail to get going

David Warner and Shikhar Dhawan got Hyderabad off to a good start scoring a boundary in each of the first three overs but just when Kolkata needed a wicket the most Umesh Yadav removed Dhawan as he held out to Robin Uthappa in the fifth over. Hyderabad were struggling to put the ball past the ropes and Sunil Narine bowled a tight final over in the powerplay, to restrict Hyderabad to 30/1 after 6 overs. Needing to up the ante to give their innings some much-needed momentum, Warner and Williamson started finding the boundaries on occasion and eventually ended up adding 13 runs to the total in the 10th over, which included a boundary and a six to take Hyderabad to 61/1 at the halfway stage of their innings.

Kolkata’s bowlers restrict Hyderabad to modest score

However, just as things were beginning to look good for the defending champions, Kolkata reasserted their authority on the game with the big wickets of both Williamson and Warner. First, the Kiwi perfectly found Suryakumar Yadav off a Coulter-Nile ball in the 12th over before Piyush Chawla ensured a double whammy for Sunrisers when he cleaned up Warner two balls later. Yuvraj Singh and Vijay Shankar then tried to rectify things for Hyderabad with a 24 run partnership off 19 balls but keeping with the trend of the game, Umesh Yadav sent Yuvraj packing when the Punjab batsman found Piyush Chawla at deep square leg with the scoreboard reading 99/4 in the 16th over. Shankar and Naman Ojha, though, picked up the pace and scored 13 in the 18th over as SRH looked to end their innings strongly. But the last two overs yielded just 10 runs as SRH handed KKR a target of 129, with the predicted rain finally making an appearance.

Gambhir books Kolkata a date with Mumbai

After a near three hour rain break, KKR were set a revised target of 48 from 6 overs. But with Chris Lynn in the side, the odds were always stacked in Kolkata’s favor and the Australian started off in typical fashion smashing Bhuvneshwar Kumar for a six in in the first over. However, Bhuvneshwar had the last laugh dismissing Lynn, and Yusuf Pathan to leave the KKR at 11/2 after the first over. Things got worse for Kolkata whe Robin Uthappa fell to Chris Jordan in the second over. However, Gautam Gambhir once again steadied the ship for his side as he smashed ten runs from the Jordan over, which included one biggie. And Gambhir’s efforts meant that at the revised halfway stage of their innings, Kolkata only needed 21 from the remaining three overs to enter the second qualifier. It was the Kolkata captain who all but sealed the deal for his side as he smashed Siddharth Kaul for 14 runs in the 4th over. Finally, the formalities were completed in the last over as Kolkata managed a 7 wicket victory to book a date against Mumbai Indians in the second qualifier on Friday.