Ravindra Jadeja’s 31 off 11 after Ruturaj Gaikwad’s 72-run knock guided Chennai Super Kings to a sixwicket win over Kolkata Knight Riders in the last ball thriller here at Dubai International Stadium on Thursday. With this win, CSK gained two valuable points and are at the bottom of the table with 10 points in 13 games.
Chasing 173, CSK openers Shane Watson and Ruturaj Gaikwad provided a steady start to the side as they added a 50-run stand. Varun Chakravarthy removed Watson (14) in the eighth over. Ambati Rayudu came in to bat at number three. He along with Gaikwad accumulated 68-run for the second wicket. After playing a knock of 38 off 20, Rayudu was sent back to the pavilion by Pat Cummins. CSK skipper MS Dhoni promoted himself up in the order and came in to bat at number four. Chakravarthy dismissed Dhoni (1) and reduced CSK to 121/3 in 14.4 overs. Sam Curran joined Gaikwad in the middle.
The latter departed after scoring 72 off 53 balls including two sixes and six fours. Ravindra Jadeja then played a knock of 31 runs while Curran remained unbeaten on 13. For KKR, Varun Chakravarthy and Pat Cummins bagged two wickets each. Earlier, Nitish Rana’s 87-run knock guided KKR to a total of 172/5 in the allotted twenty overs. Sent into bat first, KKR got off to a steady start as openers Rana and Shubman Gill put on 48 runs inside the first six overs. Both batsmen eventually stitched together an opening stand of 53 runs, but finally, the stand was broken by Karn Sharma as he clean bowled Gill (26) in the eighth over.
Sunil Narine (7) was promoted to the number three slot in order to gather some quick runs, but the move backfired as he was sent back to the pavilion by Mitchell Santner, reducing KKR to 60/2 in the ninth over. Rinku Singh was sent at number four and he along with Rana put together 33 runs for the third wicket. Ravindra Jadeja dismissed Singh (11) in the 13th over, reducing KKR to 93/3.
Brief Scores: KKR 172/5 (Nitish Rana 87, Shubman Gill 26, Lungi Ngidi 2-34) lost to CSK 178/4 (Ruturaj Gaikwad 72, Ambati Rayudu 38, Varun Chakravarthy 2-20, Pat Cummins 2-31) by six wickets