Abu Dhabi: Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) on Wednesday beat Chennai Super Kings (CSK) by 10 runs in the 21st match of the Indian Premier League at Sheikh Zayed Stadium.
Dinesh Karthik won the toss and opted to bat and Rahul Tripathi made full use of his promotion to the top of the order with an anchoring innings of 81 off 51 and had short bursts of support from Narine (17 off 9), who batted at four, and Pat Cummins (17 off 9) even as both Eoin Morgan (7) and Russell (2) had an off day. Shubman Gill (11 off 12) and Karthik (12 off 11) went cheaply too as it looked at one stage that KKR had finished well under par.
Chasing KKR’s 167, CSK found themselves 90/1 at the end of 10 overs needing a very manageable 77 off 60 balls.
However, wickets of Ambati Rayudu (30 off 27 balls) and Shane Watson (50 off 40 balls) in consecutive overs turned the match in KKR’s favour as a relatively untested middle order of MS Dhoni, Kedar Jadhav and Sam Curran failed spectacularly to see CSK limited to 157/5.
With their third victory, KKR have jumped to the third position in the points table while CSK have a lot of thinking to do if they want bring their campaign back on track.
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