Kolkata, Apr 17:
Jos Buttler swung his bat merrily on way to a 60-ball 107 and single-handedly lifted Rajasthan Royals to a sensational two-wicket victory over Kolkata Knight Riders, pulling off the IPL’s biggest run chase here today.
Asked to bat first, Sunil Narine’s 109 off 56 balls powered hosts KKR to a formidable 223/6 in front of a packed Eden Gardens.
Sunil Narine played a fantastic innings to score a century and helped Kolkata Knight Riders set a 224-run target for Rajasthan Royals in the 31st match of IPL 2024 at Eden Gardens here on Tuesday The match had an intense start with KKR losing an early wicket. Avesh Khan got Phil Salt caught and bowled for 10 in the fourth over of the game. Bowling first after winning the toss seems to have been a good decision by Sanju Samson considering the early breakthrough the team got.
Narine played a pivotal role in stabilising the innings after Salt’s early loss. Adding 85 runs with Angkrish Raghuvanshi provided KKR with a solid partnership to build their innings upon. However, losing Raghuvanshi’s wicket to Kuldeep Sen was another crucial moment in the match.
Raghuvanshi made a valuable contribution with his quickfire 30 runs off just 18 balls, including five boundaries. His partnership with Narine was crucial in accelerating the run rate for KKR.
However, Buttler had the last laugh as Narine’s maiden T20 hundred went in vain. Buttler had other ideas as he dragged RR, from a precarious 121/6 in the 13th over to the target of 224 off the last ball after the visitors needed 46 runs in the last three overs and 28 in 12 balls.
However, losing the wickets of Captain Shreyas Iyer and Andre Russell relatively cheaply caused setbacks for the team. Yuzvendra Chahal got Shreyas out LBW, and Russell departing after scoring 13 runs shifted the momentum a bit. Despite these setbacks, Narine’s outstanding century propelled KKR to a formidable total.
Narine scored 109 in just 49 balls, featuring 13 boundaries and six maximums, and played a pivotal role in KKR posting a challenging total of 223 runs for six wickets in their 20 overs.
A quickfire innings from Rinku Singh towards the end, scoring 20 runs off just nine balls, gave KKR total an extra boost. Ramandeep Singh’s unbeaten one-run also added to the total.
Chasing 224 runs, RR have a daunting task ahead of them. It will require a collective effort from their batsmen to achieve this target. With the likes of Sanju Samson, Jos Buttler, and other talented players in their lineup, they certainly have the potential to make a match out of it.
Avesh Khan and Kuldeep Sen took two wickets each, and Trent Boult and Yuzvendra Chahal chipped in with one wicket each. It will be interesting to see if RR can successfully chase down the target of 224 runs
Wickets kept falling at the other end and RR were reduced to 186/8 in the 18th over over, but Buttler showed little nerves. Needing 28 from the last two overs, Buttler had to be calculative and he did just that.
