KKR 169/10 in 20 Overs (Venkatesh Iyer 70(52), Manish Pandey 42(31); Jasprit Bumrah 3/18 in 3.5 overs) beat MI 145/10 in 18.5 Overs (Surya Kumar Yadav 56(35), Tim David 24(20); Mitchell Starc 4/33 in 3.5 overs) by 24 runs.
Two heavyweight sides clashed in one epic encounter at the Wankhede stadium in a much-awaited encounter. KKR were put into bat first on a fresh pitch which had a lot of assistance to the bowlers. As a result, MI bowlers found their groove quickly on the pitch as KKR faced a bizarre top-order collapse. Despite the collapse, they continued to strike hard as Venkatesh Iyer stood tall at one end. An important call taken by KKR management changed the momentum of the game as Manish Pandey was got in as the impact substitute to stabilise the innings. Playing the first game of this IPL, Manish did his job with perfection as he added a lot of stablity and built an excellent partnership. Venkatesh and Manish put up a terrific 83-run partnership to set a platform for a big score. However, a couple of loose shots resulted in another collapse as KKR folded their innings on 169. Venkatesh top-scored with 70 as KKR set a target of 170 for MI to chase.
Defending a sub-par total, KKR bowlers looked for wickets at the start. Mitchell Starc provided just the start KKR required as he knocked over Ishan Kishan’s stumps in style. Immediately after that wicket, KKR put a lot of pressure on the MI batters which resulted in wickets at consistent intervals. The spin-duo of Sunil Narine and Varun Chakaravarthy scalped 2 wickets each as they broke the back of the MI batting. Despite the fall of wickets, Surya Kumar Yadav kept going strong at one end and looked to steer MI to victory. However, KKR’s crisis-man Andre Russell stood up yet again picked up the big wicket of SKY to put the game in the bag of KKR. Post that brilliant effort, Mitchell Starc absolutely ran through the tail of MI to knock over MI for 145 runs as KKR completed a sensational victory. The effort to defend a sub-par total at Wankhede was a tremendous effort and KKR will take a lot of pride from this performance. With this win, KKR sit pretty at the 2nd spot and all set to qualify to the playoffs as some more exciting games await.
