Kolkata Knight Riders’ four-wicket victory over Lahore Lions followed the template that has largely been the basis of their 11-game winning run: bowl first to allow Sunil Narine and the other spinners to smother the opposition, before Robin Uthappa and the rest of the top order click to set up the chase of a lightweight target.
This match was blighted by abysmal fielding. The number of catches put down, stumpings missed and regulation stops messed up was astonishing. Narine, though, turned in another world-class performance that underlined his reputation as the best in the Twenty20 business, and 19-year-old chinaman bowler Kuldeep Yadav added to the buzz about him with a stirring effort to stifle Lions.
Lions’ best phase of the game was the opening Powerplay, when Ahmed Shehzad struck some big hits down the ground to push the score to 47 for 0. This despite Narine bowling a maiden in the fifth over. A stunning direct hit from Andre Russell broke the opening stand in the seventh over, by when the wicketkeeper Manvinder Bisla had already mucked up two straightforward stumpings.
The Knight Riders’ spinners took charge in the middle overs, with Kuldeep showing solid control for a wrist-spinner, getting his stock ball to turn plenty and using the wrong ‘un to confuse the batsmen. Mohammad Hafeez spent much of his short innings trying to heave the ball to midwicket before he became Kuldeep’s first victim, holing out for 9.
When Shehzad found Uthappa at long-off in the 13th over to finish on a chancy 59, Lions’ top-heavy batting was in trouble, especially with three Narine overs to come. The trepidation of the lesser lights in the batting line-up was obvious when they faced Narine: Saad Nasim missed his first ball and edged his second to short cover, Umar Siddiq lasted one more before being done in by the quicker one, and Asif Raza was bowled first ball. Narine nearly had a hat-trick, but Wahab Riaz had his boot back in the crease before Bisla could break the stumps.
Umar Akmal was still there, though, and he clobbered Piyush Chawla and Pat Cummins to lift Lions past 150.
Gautam Gambhir and Uthappa, aided by some comically inept fielding, put on a century stand to set Knight Riders on course for victory. They were coasting for a large part of the chase before a slew of wickets towards the end briefly made things tight, only for Suryakumar Yadav to finish it off with a five-ball 14
LAHORE LIONS
Nasir Jamshed run out (Russell) 10
Ahmed Shehzad c Uthappa b Chawla 59
Mohammad Hafeez c Russell b Kuldeep Yadav 9
Umar Akmal c Gambhir b Cummins 40
Saad Nasim c Yadav b Narine 0
Umar Siddiq lbw b Narine 2
Asif Raza b Narine 0
Wahab Riaz not out 14
Extras (b 5, lb 5, w 7) 17
Total (7 wickets; 20 overs) 151
Did not batMustafa Iqbal, Adnan Rasool, Aizaz Cheema
Fall of wickets 1-50 (Nasir Jamshed, 6.4 ov), 2-75 (Mohammad Hafeez, 10.6 ov), 3-91 (Ahmed Shehzad, 12.4 ov), 4-98 (Saad Nasim, 13.5 ov), 5-103 (Umar Siddiq, 15.2 ov), 6-103 (Asif Raza, 15.3 ov), 7-151 (Umar Akmal, 19.6 ov)
Bowling
PJ Cummins 4-0-38-1, AD Russell 4-0-38-0, PP Chawla 4-0-35-1, SP Narine 4-1-9-3, Kuldeep Yadav 4-0-21-1
KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS
RV Uthappa b Adnan Rasool 46
G Gambhir b Mustafa Iqbal 60
MS Bisla c †Umar Akmal b Aizaz Cheema 6
YK Pathan c Wahab Riaz b Aizaz Cheema 11
RN ten Doeschate lbw b Wahab Riaz 12
SA Yadav not out 14
AD Russell c Adnan Rasool b Asif Raza 1
PJ Cummins not out 0
Extras (w 3) 3
Total (6 wickets; 19.3 overs) 153
Did not batPP Chawla, SP Narine, Kuldeep Yadav
Fall of wickets 1-100 (Uthappa, 12.3 ov), 2-113 (Gambhir, 14.3 ov), 3-115 (Bisla, 15.1 ov), 4-135 (Pathan, 17.2 ov), 5-146 (ten Doeschate, 18.3 ov), 6-147 (Russell, 19.1 ov)
Bowling
Mohammad Hafeez 3-0-23-0, Asif Raza 1.3-0-10-1, Aizaz Cheema 4-0-42-2, Wahab Riaz 4-0-25-1, Adnan Rasool 4-0-28-1, Mustafa Iqbal 3-0-25-1
MATCH DETAILS
Toss – Kolkata Knight Riders, who chose to field
Points – Kolkata Knight Riders 4, Lahore Lions 0
Player of the match – SP Narine (Kolkata Knight Riders)
Umpires – HDPK Dharmasena (Sri Lanka) and C Shamshuddin
TV umpire – AK Chaudhary
Match referee – AJ Pycroft (Zimbabwe)
Reserve umpire – A Nand Kishore
