The Raipur pitch had some purchase for the quicks. But when Virat Kohli brings his A-game, opponents are left with little to do.
Kolkata Knight Riders did not have the best of starts on Wednesday, but they rode Angkrish Raghuvanshi’s sensible 71 off 46 balls and Rinku Singh’s unbeaten 49 off 29 balls to post 192/4 after the match started 75 minutes late due
to rain.
Slambang cricket and hitting through the line at will wasn’t possible on the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh Stadium surface, especially with Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s in-form pace duo of Bhuvneshwar Kumar (1/34) and Josh Hazlewood (1/35) not giving much away.
Still, RCB’s target wasn’t all that easy with the conditions on offer. But Kohli (105 not out off 60 balls) produced an innings of sheer quality, registering his ninth IPL
ton to take RCB to a six-wicket victory. The win took
the defending champions on top of the standings with a foot in the playoffs.
The Knights, who missed the injured Varun Chakravarthy, had their playoffs hopes dashed further. To keep their hopes alive, they must win their remaining three games — all at the Eden next — which will help them finish on 15 points. The results of the other matches too should suit the Knights to keep their chances alive. Even then, it will boil down to net run rate.
Poise & diligence
The solidity with which Kohli played, it never seemed as if he went into this game with back-to-back zeros. Yes, Vaibhav Arora, after debutant pacer Saurabh Dubey conceded only two in the first over of the run chase, kept bowling to Kohli’s strengths that allowed the former India and RCB captain to get his eye in and some easy boundaries as well.
But right through Kohli’s stay, there was barely any loose or unnecessary stroke, though he did mistime the ball on a few occasions, en route to being the fastest to 14,000 T20 runs. But he soon followed them up with some class strokes, which included a brilliantly timed front-footed six straight over the top off Anukul Roy in the 17th over before whipping Kartik Tyagi over deep-midwicket for another maximum in the next.
Varun’s presence would surely have tested Kohli,
but he still had to deal with Sunil Narine.
The professional that Kohli has mostly been through his career, he ensured doing nothing fancy against the premier off-spinner, focusing on treating the ball on its merit. Narine, too, couldn’t pose any trouble for Kohli as the chase-master eventually took the defending champions home with five balls remaining.
The Knights could still have put a little more pressure on Kohli had Arora not dropped a sitter at deep square leg that let Devdutt Padikkal off in the eighth over. Padikkal was on 22 then. That reprieve allowed the Kohli-Padikkal second-wicket partnership to add another 51 runs, which proved to be crucial in the end.
Also, barring Tyagi to an extent and Narine, the rest
of the KKR bowlers looked
pedestrian.
