Agencies
New Delhi, April 28
Two-time winners Chennai Super Kings beat defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders by two runs in a thrilling IPL match at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai on Tuesday.
Chasing a 135-run target, Kolkata managed 132/9 in their 20 overs with Dwayne Bravo taking 3/22 from his three overs, ably aided by Ravichandran Ashwin who took 2/5 in his two overs before going off the field with an injury to his bowling hand.
Bravo bowled a superb last over to Ryan ten Doeschate (38*) conceding 14 runs when Kolkata needed 17 for victory.
Chennai registered their ninth successive win at home to move to the top of the points table.
The Kolkata run chase got off to a bad start as their captain Gautam Gambhir fell for a first ball duck on the second delivery of their innings.
Robin Uthappa and Manish Pandey added 51 runs for the second wicket before Ashwin dismissed Uthappa (39) on the first ball of his spell having him caught by Brendon McCullum at mid-wicket.
Ashwin struck again in his next over when he had Pandey (15) caught by Bravo at deep mid-wicket.
Bravo then took a superb running catch at mid-on to dismiss Suryakumar Yadav (16) off Mohit Sharma to reduce the visitors to 76/4.
Not done yet, Bravo then clean bowled Yusuf Pathan (13) with a slower delivery to make it 91/5.
The final nail in the coffin for Kolkata came when Andre Russell (4) failed to beat a superb throw by Ravindra Jadeja from deep mid-wicket into the hands of Chennai captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni and was run out.
Bravo then took his second wicket when he had Pat Cummins (0) caught by Jadeja at deep mid-wicket.
Andre Russell picked up two wickets to prove his worth with the ball. (PTI Photo)
Earlier, Kolkata produced a disciplined bowling performance to restrict Chennai for a modest 134/6.
Russell (2/26) and Piyush Chawla (2/26) were the pick of the bowlers, while Brad Hogg snapped one after Gambhir won the toss and elected to field. Dwayne Smith (25) and Brendon McCullum (19) gave Chennai a blistering start as they put Kolkata attack to the sword and picked up fours and sixes at will to amass 38 in four overs.
Gambhir then introduced Chawla into the attack and the leg-spinner dismissed McCullum after trapping him in front of the wicket. The New Zealand skipper blasted three fours and one six in his 14-ball innings.
New batsman Raina, however, seemed unfazed as he sent Chawla over the fence with a powerful slog sweep in the square leg region in the last ball of the over.
Spinner Brad Hogg and pacer Andre Russell then checked the run flow with some good bowling as Smith and Raina looked for singles and twos.
In the ninth over, Smith was dismissed by a brilliant throw by Yusuf Pathan who hit the stumps after the batsmen were trying to steal a quick single. The West Indies batsman hit three boundaries and a six in his 19-ball stay.
In the next over, Russell sent Raina packing when he induced an edge from the batsman with wicketkeeper Robin Uthappa taking the catch as Chennai were reduced to 67/3.
Skipper Dhoni (3) also didn't stay long as his six-ball stay was cut short by a bouncer from Russell as Chennai slumped to 81/4.
Chawla then returned to dismiss West Indies all-rounder Dwayne Bravo (5), who looking for a big shot ended up giving a simple catch to S Yadav at long-off.
New man Faf du Plessis (29 not out) then brought up the hundred for Chennai with a couple of runs at deep square leg.
With wickets tumbling, du Plessis and Ravindra Jadeja (15) needed some big hits but the duo failed to raise the run rate with Hogg cleaning up the latter with a quicker ball in the 19th over.
