Dubbed as the ‘Battle Royale’ of this edition of IPL, Gautam Gambhir and his boys held their nerves as Pune batting again faltered at the death to slump to their fifth consecutive defeat.

Sourav Ganguly couldn’t guide Pune to win against Kolkata Knight Riders

Kolkata Knight Riders got to a rollicking start as Pune Warriors hit back in the last 10 overs to restrict the hosts to 150 for five in their Indian Premier League at a jam-packed Eden Gardens. Having done the hard work to restrict Knight Riders to a middling 150 after a rousing start, Warriors were tottering at 55 for 5. Ganguly curiously demoted himself to No. 7 and the chants for his arrival grew louder with the fall of every top-order wicket. Sunil Narine’s variations left Ganguly fighting for dear life, but having survived the spell, he ran out of steam as Knight Riders found some late inspiration in the field.

Kolkata skipper Gautam Gambhir played yet another captain’s knock as his third consecutive half-century laid the foundation of a big score, which though eluded the home team. An opening stand of 113 between Gautam Gambhir and Brendon McCullum gave them the foundation to entertain thoughts of 200 and beyond. It was the start of the slide for Knight Riders. After hammering 106 off 11 overs, Knight Riders managed only 44 in the last nine – their worst performance in all IPL seasons.

Chasing has been the flop – side of PWI, they couldn’t manage 120 against MI. They were expected to learned lessons from that game, but failed to chase 150 score. KKR had the Warriors reeling at 55 for five at one stage before Ganguly and Mathews’ 73-run sixth wicket partnership which came off just 56 balls turned the match in the visitors favour. Walking in later than anticipated, Ganguly was silenced by Narine with four scoreless deliveries. Narine’s spell, which featured 14 dots balls and some inspired fielding by Laxmi Ratan Shukla, put the target out of Warriors’ reach.

Mathews hit Yusuf Pathan for three consecutive sixes to score 19 runs off the 15th over and put Pune in sight of a victory as the equation was reduced to 42 from 30 balls. But Ganguly’s dismissal soon after he hit a six over long on off Rajat Bhatia in the 18th over swung the match in KKR’s favour.Dada left Pune in tough position where they needed almost 12 runs per over.

The match lived up to its hype as fortunes kept on fluctuating till the last over when the asking rate got too high with 18 runs required off six deliveries. With 12 needed from last three balls, Mathews perished in search of a big one, brilliantly caught by Laxmi Ratan at long on to virtually pocket the match for KKR. Kolkata loyalists got what they wanted – a win, plus a contribution from Ganguly.

Tags: Battle Royale, Cricket, Gautam Gambhir, IPL, KKR, Kolkata Knight Riders, Pune Warriors, PWI, Sourav Ganguly