Shimron Hetmyer and Shreyas Iyer perished in two successive deliveries - both looking to clear the long-on fence but ended up losing their wicket to Varun Chakravarthy. The two dismissals put an end to Delhi’s chase as they were floored by Eoin Morgan’s men in Abu Dhabi. Chakravarthy scalped a few more sticks to bag his maiden five-for in the IPL - first five-wicket haul by a KKR bowler since Sunil Narine did it in 2012.
Narine plundered big after Powerplay, Poor tactics hurt Capitals
Delhi conceded 115 runs in the middle overs i.e from the 7th to 16th over. Sunil Narine joined hands with Nitish Rana to stitch a vital stand after the Delhi bowlers restricted Kolkata to 42/3 at one stage. Rana hit a watchful 81 off 53 balls while Narine scored an entertaining 32-ball 64.
Ordinary feilding coupled with poor tactics didn’t help the Delhi side. The pace pack comprising Kagiso Rabada and Andre Nortje didn’t bowl a single short delivery to Rana as the batters kept milking runs. The pacers bowled full and hardly tested KKR batters with variations. Ravi Ashwin’s introduction against two left-handers made little sense as it encouraged Narine to go big without any threat.
Rana hit 13 boundaries and one six as Kolkata posted 194/6 on the board. Delhi, in reply, got off to the worst possible start - losing Ajinkya Rahane in the very first ball of the chase. Pat Cummins got the ball to jag back into the batter after it pitched outside off-stump to trap Rahane’s pad. Cummins then removed in-form Shikar Dhawan to put Capitals in hot water.
Skipper Iyer and Rishabh Pant tried to put on a rescue act and together the duo amassed 63 runs for the fourth wicket. Iyer hit five fours but fell just short of a fifty by three runs. Delhi chase was well but over once their captain head back to the pavilion. The 59-run loss will hamper the net run rate of the Capitals, who look to finish in the top-two. On the other hand, Kolkata took a major leap and are now at 12 points - four clear off the next team on the table.
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