PURPLE PATCH
Kolkata beats Mumbai by seven wickets, makes it two wins in two matches in IPL Phase 2
Kolkata Knight Riders finally turned the tables on its nemesis Mumbai Indians with a thumping seven-wicket win in the IPL here on Thursday.
This was a much-needed win for two-time champion Kolkata (8 points) as it helped it move up to fourth in the table, while Mumbai (8 points) dropped to sixth. Such was KKR’s dominance that it raced to its fourth victory with 29 balls to spare.
Kolkata made mincemeat of its target of 156 with Venkatesh Iyer (53, 30b, 4x4, 3x6) and Rahul Tripathi, unbeaten on 74 (42b, 8x4, 3x6), scoring the bulk of the runs. None of the Mumbai bowlers was spared by the duo as they went on a rampage scoring fours and sixes at will. Southpaw Iyer particularly impressed with his elegant strokeplay and looked comfortable against both pace and spin. Tripathi, meanwhile, ably complemented Iyer before cutting loose with ramp shots and scoops.
Earlier, Quinton de Kock struck an entertaining half-century before Kolkata bounced back to restrict Mumbai to 155 for six. Returning MI skipper Rohit Sharma (33 off 30) got off the innings in scintillating fashion, caressing a Nitish Rana delivery on to the mid-off boundary.
Rohit took the attack to mystery spinner Varun Charkravarthy with consecutive fours in the opening two deliveries of the fourth over. de Kock (55 off 42, 4x4, 3x6) was not to be left behind as he matched his skipper stroke for stroke, pulling a Lockie Ferguson delivery over the fence.
Introduced into the attack in the sixth over, Prasidh Krishna was taken to task by de Kock, hitting the medium pacer twice over the fence to pick up 16 runs. de Kock seemed unstoppable as he welcomed Andre Russell with consecutive fours. Morgan bowled out trump card Chakravarthy by the 11th over (4-0-22-0) with MI not losing a wicket against him. But in the second half of the innings, Mumbai badly failed to build on the momentum.
Brief scores: Mumbai Indians 155/6 in 20 overs (Q de Kock 55, L Ferguson 2/27) lost to Kolkata Knight Riders 159/3 in 15.1 overs (V Iyer 53, R Tripathi 74*)