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When two sides filled with power-hitters go toe to toe on a good track, it could go boom or bust. For Punjab Kings (PK), who chased 206 with an over to spare in their season-opener, it was the latter at the Wankhede Stadium on Friday. For Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) too, it appeared to be heading in a similar direction halfway into their chase of 138, until Andre Russell and Sam Billings brought them on track before steering away to a six-wicket win.
Russell justified KKR’s trust in playing him as a pure batter with an unbeaten 31-ball 70 that had eight towering sixes to inject stability and then wings into a wobbly run chase. Billings (24*) played his part in an unbroken 90-run stand that hammered the nails into PK in a largely forgettable outing after their opening high. When an opener, who also happens to be the captain, makes room to have a heave off the first ball of the match, the intentions are laid down pretty clearly. PK skipper Mayank Agarwal missed that ball, and the fifth one as well, playing all across a straight one on a good length by Umesh Yadav to be trapped leg-before.
You’re putting on a show if you can effortlessly cream Tim Southee over covers, like Bhanuka Rajapaksa (31, 9b) was. The Sri Lankan tore into Shivam Mavi in the fourth over, smacking three consecutive sixes. But Mavi went round the wicket, pulled his length back and cramped Rajapaksa for room to get him caught at mid-off the next ball. If Rajapaksa was striking at above 300, Shikhar Dhawan was going at less than run a ball. Soon after the opener nudged his strike rate past 100, he perished caught behind off Southee. PK lost three wickets in the powerplay, but also scored 62. That’s when the KKR bowlers applied the brakes, with 19-year-old Raj Bawa taking his time to get behind the wheel. KKR captain Shreyas Iyer wasn’t content merely checking the flow of runs. He turned to his strike bowler in the ninth over, and Yadav had Liam Livingstone (19, 16b) holed out at long-off.
Bawa struck his lone boundary off Sunil Narine before being cleaned up the next ball. Shahrukh Khan perished for a duck going for a big one, and PK added only 30 runs in the seven overs after the powerplay to be 92/6. That they got closer to the 150-run mark was only courtesy some lusty blows by Kagiso Rabada (25, 16b). The dangerous Odean Smith, who got them over the line in the previous game, remained stuck on 9 off 12 as the PK innings ended with 10 unused deliveries. Yadav ended with four wickets cleaning up the tail.
All KKR needed to get past 137 was a half-decent start followed by some sensible batting. There was a lack of both in their innings’ first half. After two smart catches by Smith and Harpreet Brar saw the back of openers Ajinkya Rahane and Venkatesh Iyer, Shreyas—cruising along at 26 in 14 balls till then—went for a slog sweep off leg-spinner Rahul Chahar, only to top edge it. Two balls later, Nitish Rana was leg-before, turning a relatively straightforward chase interesting at 51/4 in seven overs.
But Russell and Billings read the situation, dropped anchor for a couple of overs and then unleashed their striking prowess. Particularly the former, who hit KKR’s first six in the 10th over by Brar and added four more in the next 10 balls he faced, including three off Smith’s 12th over, to dramatically swing the game back in KKR’s favour.
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