KKR boss at home
India under-19 sensation Shubman Gill scored his maiden Indian Premier League (IPL) half-century to guide hosts Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) to a six-wicket win against table-toppers Chennai Super Kings (CSK) at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Thursday night.
Batting at No. 4, Gill scored 57 and stitched an unbeaten 83run partnership for the fifth wicket with skipper Dinesh Karthik, who scored 45 runs off 18 balls. Gill smashed six fours and two sixes during his 36-ball knock, while Karthik struck seven fours and one six.
Earlier, Kolkata Knight Riders spinners impressed with Sunil Narine leading from the front before Chennai Super Kings' inspirational captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni's late flourish guided his side to 177 for five.
It was skipper Dhoni who once again propped up the total with an unbeaten 43 from 25 balls that included four sixes and one four. Narine returned with impressive figures of 2 for 20, while Piyush Chawla grabbed 2 for 35 as the duo bowled 22 dot balls in the middle overs to keep CSK's batting in check after the Chennai outfit had crossed 200-plus totals four times this season.
Young pacer Shivam Mavi also impressed with his pace and bounce during but went wicketless giving away 21 runs from three overs as CSK scored bulk of their runs against veteran Australian left-arm pacer Mitchell Johnson who leaked 51 runs from his four overs.
Against the batting firepower of CSK, it was a tidy KKR bowling that was on display after Dinesh Karthik opted to chase.
In a battle between two ageing Aussies, it was Shane Watson (36) who impressed up front against KKR pace spearhead Johnson who leaked 10 and 19 runs from his first two overs. But thankfully for KKR, youngster Mavi put the brakes from the other end showing superb control with his pace and was not afraid to pitch the ball short against CSK's opening duo of Watson and Faf du Plessis (27).
Mavi just gave away 11 runs from his two overs as CSK were in a spot of bother before Watson helped the visitors score 57 for 1 in powerplay.
But good thing for KKR was that they managed to get a breakthrough inside the powerplay with Chawla dismissing Du Plessis.
Chawla delivered with his first ball cleaning up the South African skipper with a googly, and after that CSK batsmen struggled against KKR spin trio with Narine standing tall.
Dinesh Karthik used Narine wisely, first introducing him in the powerplay and then gave two in the middle overs.
Narine's 11th and 15th overs were crucial as the Trinidadian dismissed his 'bunny' Watson (36) for the seventh time in T20 matches and also removed Rayudu (21), the two leading run getters of CSK.
Suresh Raina (31) also failed to score big before as he was dismissed by Kuldeep Yadav. It was then left to the 'captain cool' Dhoni to finish CSK's innings on a high.