The 49th match of the IPL 2020 saw Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) taking on Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in what was a do or die match for Eoin Morgan’s side in Dubai. MS Dhoni won the toss and put KKR into bat first.
The KKR innings saw Nitish Rana show off his full range of shots as he made 87 in 61 balls with 10 fours and 4 sixes. Shubman Gill made 26, while Karthik made 10-ball 25* to take KKR to 172/5 in 20 overs.
Lungi Ngidi picked 2/34 on his return to the CSK playing XI.
In reply, Ruturaj Gaikwad heralded the CSK chase with a sublime 72 from 53 balls with 6 fours and 2 sixes, while Rayudu made 38 in 20 balls. Ruturaj played a brilliant knock from the start as he took the battle to the bowlers and even played the spinners well.
It came down quite close in the end, but an unflustered Ravindra Jadeja hit two back-to-back sixes when 7 runs were needed off the last 2 balls from Kamlesh Nagarkoti, to ensure CSK won the match by 6 wickets. He remained unbeaten on 31 from 11 balls with 2 fours and 3 sixes and had taken one wicket as well.
Pat Cummins (2/31) and Varun Chakravarthy (2/20) were the wicket-takers for KKR.
With this loss, CSK has 10 points from 13 matches, while KKR, who needed a win here, are still placed 5th with 12 points from 13 matches with an NRR of -0.467. However, CSK's win over KKR ensured that Mumbai Indians became the first team to qualify for the playoffs.
The cricket fraternity lauded Jadeja’s death overs hitting as CSK celebrated their second straight victory.
Here are the tweets:
