Kolkata Knight Riders hosted the table-toppers Chennai Super Kings in the 33rd match of IPL 2018 at the iconic Eden Gardens on Thursday (May 3) night.
After being put into bat by KKR skipper Dinesh Karthik, CSK got off to a flier with Shane Watson and Faf du Plessis putting a 48-run stand in just 5 overs. After du Plessis’ dismissal, Suresh Raina carried on the good work and forged a 43-run partnership with Watson, who perished for 36 runs off 25 balls to Sunil Narine’s short delivery.
Soon after Watson’s wicket, CSK lost Raina to a well-flighted Kuldeep Yadav delivery on 31. Batting with utmost authority in this year’s IPL, MS Dhoni then took the centre stage and played a scintillating knock of 43 runs in just 25 balls that propelled CSK to a highly competitive total of 178/5 in 20 overs.
Sunil Narine was the stand-out bowler for KKR as he scalped 2 for 21 in his 4 overs. Piyush Chawla also claimed 2 wickets by conceding 35 runs in his 4 overs.
Like always, the Twitterverse was buzzing during the IPL match. Here are some of the top tweets hailing Dhoni and CSK’s stellar show with the bat:
One of the reasons for #Dhoni 's greatness is, he knows who n when to go after. Brilliant again #KKRvCSK
— Deep Dasgupta (@DeepDasgupta7) May 3, 2018
May be it is the pressure @msdhoni creates that results in regulation drops. Shubman Gill today, @DelhiDaredevils the other night. Otherwise these are regulation chances that can’t keep getting dropped.
— Boria Majumdar (@BoriaMajumdar) May 3, 2018
How often will you see spinners bowling 18-19-20th overs in a T20 game? Also, wondering when #CSK will start thinking of sending Bravo ahead of Jadeja... #KKRvCSK #IPL
— Aakash Chopra (@cricketaakash) May 3, 2018
The support for #CSK on the road has been one of the events of #IPL2018 for me. Much of it is down to the Dhoni factor. Only comparison I can think of is Sachin & #MI in #IPL1 back in 2008
— Harsha Bhogle (@bhogleharsha) May 3, 2018
Deadly combo this Rayudu and MS one extremely good against spin and the other against pace ,they complement each other beautifully #KKRvCSK #BestvsBest #IPL2018 #BadriBytes
— subramani badrinath (@s_badrinath) May 3, 2018
Fascinating so far. Many 20s & 30s but no half century for CSK. Credit to KKR, especially Narine & captain Karthik. But 179 target not easy
— Cricketwallah (@cricketwallah) May 3, 2018
