In a rich history of 12 long years, India’s cash-rich league the IPL has mostly ended in May. Till now, only 2 IPL matches have been played in June, and surprisingly so both the matches were played on 1st June. Spread by 6 years, On this day IPL saw 2 teams crowned champions as 2 IPL finals were held on this date.
On June 1 2008, an underdogs Rajasthan Royals clinched the maiden trophy and in the first edition of the IPL. Exactly six years later, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) defeated Kings XI Punjab on this day to lift their 2nd IPL title.
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Reminiscing back to the first-ever IPL final, Rajasthan Royals took on MS Dhoni-led Chennai Super Kings. The Shane Warne-led Rajasthan Royals won the toss and asked fellow finalists CSK to bat first.
Yusuf Pathan stole the limelight amongst specialist bowlers as the all-rounder claimed 3 major wickets. Pathan got rid of both CSK openers and also dismissed Albie Morkel. He ended up giving just 22 runs from his 4 overs. With a god all-rounder bowling performance, RR restricted CSK to 163/5 in the first innings.
Chasing 164 it was Yusuf Pathan once again who top-scored for his team with 56 runs as Rajasthan Royals claimed their first and only IPL Title. Yousuf Pathan was also adjudged Man-of-the-Match in the final for his contributions with the bat and ball.
6 years later, Gautam Gambhir led KKR faced an uphill task against Kings XI Punjab in the IPL finals. Both the high octane teams faced off against each other in a nail-biter thriller at Bengaluru.
Electing to field first s4ems to be the wrong decision as Kings XI Punjab batsman hailed storms at the KKR Bowlers. Manan Vora helped himself to a 52 ball 67. Keeper Wriddhimann Saha’s dominating 115 off just 55 balls helped KIXP register a mammoth 199 onboard after 20 overs.
For the Kight Riders, Manish Pandey stole the show as he blitzkrieg on the KXIP bowlers. Pandey raced up to an aggressive 94 off just 50 balls as KKR kept the run-rate always within reaching distance.
Gautam Gambhir, Yusuf Pathan, and Shakib Al Hasan surrounded Pandey’s knock with quickfire contributions. KKR chased down the 200-run target with 3 balls remaining and lifted their second trophy.
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A big factor similarizes both the IPL final victories on this day. Both Rajasthan Royals and Kolkata Knight Riders decided to chase the target down rather than setting it up. Surprisingly, the winning margins of both RR and KKR are crazily the same. as they registered a 3-wicket victory to clinch their respective IPL title.
