Raiphi Gomez

Kochi Tuskers Kerala, the tournament debutants win the match against Kolkata Knight Riders.  They look to impress everyone by beating all good teams. During their last encounter, Kolkata lost by six runs at Eden Gardens. Kolkata started as favorites, won the toss and elected to field first. With 12 points being on the second spot in the IPL table, but they couldn’t recover from blows by Gomez.

Raiphi Gomez struck two consecutive wickets for Kochi Tuskers to put the Kolkata Kinght Riders on the back foot at the Nehru stadium in Kochi on Thursday. After that Kolkata could not recover from there.

After putting an important partnership of 69 runs with Eoin Morgan made, Jacques Kallis 45 (41) was dismissed by Gomez of a sly leg cutter. Kallis tried to square drive without getting the weight forward, the ball snuck past the bat and hit the top of off stump.

Kochi batting first did not had a great start well. Kolkata’s Jaidev Unadkat bowled down a wide, a short ball and a slower ball in this first four deliveries and then bowled a poor delivery – too short and too wide outside off – that Brendon McCullum chased it, finally taking a fine edge into the safest hands of cricket world Jacques Kallis’ at slip.

Jayawardene sent Parthiv Patel at no.3 to the crease instead of himself and which was a good decision. After when Jayawardene came in, stage was set. Mahela Jayawardene’s made a half-century which was important knock and Brad Hodge’s contributed with a cameo of 35 off 19, so posted score in excess of 150. Kochi scored 54 runs of last four overs, including Hodge’s 21 runs off Lee’s final over, which proved the match winning runs.

KKR started their chase very well by scoring at 7.00 runs per over with no wickets; Kallis and Moragn were looking impressive. After Gomez’s double-strike to remove Kallis and Gambhir was crucial for Kochi’s resurgence in the match. Manoj Tiwary could not last long, and Yusuf Pathan was expected to counterattack, but could not blast. Finally, with a disciplined performance in the field, KKR needed 25 runs of the last over, bowled by RP Singh with Boucher and Bret Lee on pitch.

Now Kochi has spiced up the race for the play-offs with a big enough win against one of the tournament favourites.

Tags: Brag Hodge, Indian Premier League, IPL, KKR, Kochi Tuskers Kerala, Kolkata Knight Riders, KTK, Raiphi Gomez