Kolkata Knight Riders were heavily struggling at one stage. Although the score was 90 in the 10th over, Kolkata had lost half their side. At 90/5, even the score of 160 looked distant. But Knight Riders had two of their best hitters on the pitch in Dinesh Karthik and Andre Russell. The rest of the night belonged to Andre Russell, who ended up with smashing 88 runs off 55 balls with 11 sixes.
At the 15 overs mark, Kolkata Knight Riders stood at 123/5 with Andre Russell on 20*(16)
This is how the next five overs went
16th over – 15 runs
17th over – 19 runs (Three Sixes hit off Dwayne Bravo)
18th over – 10 runs
19th over – 21 runs (Three Sixes hit off Dwayne Bravo)
20th over – 14 runs
Andre Russell finished with 88 runs off 36 balls. The hurricane innings consisted only one four but a whopping 11 sixes!
The start tonight for KKR was launched again by Sunil Narine who smacked two huge sixes in the first over of Deepak Chahar. It was the experience of Harbhajan Singh that defeated Narine’s wild intentions by giving some flight to the ball. Chris Lynn hit some cracking shots but he failed to made it big and got out for 22 off 16 balls.
Hero of the last match, Nitish Rana failed to impress with the bat and was sent back with 16 runs off 14 balls. Robin Uthappa who looked in great touch tonight was criminally run-out by Dinesh Karthik who did not check Uthappa’s compliance to the single.
Rinku Singh’s dismissal off Shardul Thakur’s bowling brought the pair Russell and Karthik together. The duo consolidated for the next few overs. Then came the 15th over mark, where they unleashed themselves on the Chennai bowers and rest is already stated.
