Agencies
Mohali, April 19: Robin Uthappa (53, 28b, 9×4) and Gautam Gambhir (34, 34b, 3×4) put on an 82 runs opening stand in 8.3 overs to propel Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) to a six-wicket win in their IPL-IX match against Kings XI Punjab at the PCA Stadium here, Tuesday.
After their pacers and spinners had bowled well in tandem to restrict the hosts to a not-to-impressive 138 for eight, Uthappa and Gambhir virtually sealed the fate of the match with their brilliant stand. KXIP fought back a bit after Uthappa’s dismissal through their spinners Pradeep Sahu (2/18) and Axar Patel (2/19), but the fate of the game was never in doubt.
Uthappa and Gambhir have been in tremendous form this season and they followed it up with another 50-plus stand as KKR recorded their third victory in four outings. Uthappa again was the aggressor playing some lovely drives while Gambhir played some beautiful shots square off the wicket.
Earlier putting the opposition into bat after winning the toss, the KKR bowlers utilised the pitch which offered some assistance to chip away wickets at regular intervals. As a result, the KXIP innings never got the momentum it desired and they failed even to reach the 140-run mark, something which is considered to be a competitive total in this format of the game.
Save for Shaun Marsh (56, n o 41b, 5×4, 1×6) and Murali Vijay (26, 22b, 4×4) none of their batsmen got going against a bowling attack that was disciplined as well as penetrative.
Morne Morkel (2/27), Umesh Yadav (1/17), Sunil Narine (2/22), Piyush Chawla (1/18) and even Yusuf Pathan (1/6) got their name on the scoreboard. The only disappointment was Andre Russell who was taken to the cleaners for 18 runs in the last over of the innings.
However, KKR will definitely be happy at the way, Narine bowled. The West Indian seemed to have recovered his old guile with a changed action. Even though he mainly bowled off-spinners, Narine varied his pace beautifully to pick up the crucial wickets of Wriddhiman Saha and Glenn Maxwell.
