In today’s match between Rising Pune Supergiant and Kolkata Knight Riders, Ajinkya Rahane was dismissed yet again by Sunil Narine. It was the third time in six outings that the West Indian had got rid of Rahane. The 28-year old right-hand batsman has scored 42 runs in 39 balls at a paltry run rate of 6.46 against Narine in the Indian Premier League.
Knight Riders have included an extra spinner in Piyush Chawla in place of Nathan Coulter-Nile. Resultant of which, a couple of stumping chances came Robin Uthappa’s way. However, the batsman survived on both the occasions.
But Rahane’s foot was in the air when Narine beat him outside the off stump. Losing his balance, Rahane was late in putting his foot down and hence had to walk back to the pavilion. If Rahane was beaten by Narine in front of the wickets, Uthappa did the same behind the wickets.
Rahane was not the only casualty to Uthappa’s wicket-keeping skills. In the 18th over, Kuldeep Yadav picked up two wickets, both in the form of stumping. On the third delivery, he deceived MS Dhoni with his wrong-un. Dhoni came down the track only to be stumped by Uthappa as he was neither close to the ball nor the batting crease.
On the fifth delivery, Manoj Tiwary failed to read Kuldeep Yadav’s wrong-un. He perhaps thought that the ball would turn towards him but was caught short of the crease.
Watch the full video of Uthappa’s brilliance:
Featured image source: iplt20.com (screen grab)
Video Credits – IPL.