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Narine stars with bat and ball as Kolkata claim vital win over Delhi

football29 April 2025 18:30| © MWP
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Sunil Narine produced yet another match-winning performance in his illustrious career to lead the Kolkata Knight Riders to a season-changing, 14-run victory against the Delhi Capitals in their IPL match at the Arun Jaitley Stadium in Delhi on Tuesday.

Defending an imposing total of 204-9 the Knight Riders were under pressure with Delhi on 136-3 in the 13th over before Narine had a rampaging Axar Patel (43 from 23 balls) caught at cover and bowled Tristan Stubbs (1) with a conventional off-break which the Capitals restricted to 190-9 in reply.

Faf du Plessis’s fine innings of 62 from 45 balls (7x4, 2x6) was ended with a skewed slog-sweep against Narine to deep midwicket and suddenly the game had changed dramatically at 146-6 with Narine completing an outstanding analysis of 4-0-29-3.

Vipraj Nigam (38 from 19) did his best to keep Delhi alive with five fours and two sixes in the final overs but, with 25 required off the final over bowled by Andre Russell, it was a bridge too far when the Jamaican allrounder bowled him.

Legspinner Varun Chakravarthy (2-39) also played a significant role in Delhi’s late demise with two wickets in his final over.

Earlier Afghan opener Rahmanullah Gurbaz set a cracking pace in the Power Play for KKR with 26 from just 12 balls, five of which were sent to the boundary and one over it before Mitchell Starc (3-43) had him caught by ‘keeper Abishek Porel.

Fellow opener Narine lashed a pair of fours and sixes himself in 27 from 16 balls and captain Ajinkya Rahane maintained the tempo with 26 from 14 to lay a platform for considerably more than the eventual 204-9 at 113-3 in just 9.1 overs.

But, as well as Angrish Raghuvanshi (44 from 32 balls) and Rinku Singh (36 from 25) played, they were limited to six fours and three sixes between them by some ingenious bowling from experienced spinners Kuldeep Yadav (3-0-27-0) and captain Axar Patel whose four overs yielded an outstanding 2-27.

The result leaves Delhi in sole-possession of fourth place with six wins and 12 points from their 10 matches while Kolkata move up to seventh place and keep alive their playoff aspirations with a fourth win and nine points from 10 matches.

DELHI CAPITALS: Faf du Plessis, Abishek Porel (wkt), Karun Nair, KL Rahul, Axar Patel (captain), Tristan Stubbs, Vipraj Nigam, Mitchell Starc, Kuldeep Yadav, Dushmantha Chameera, Mukesh Kumar

KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS: Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wkt), Sunil Narine, Ajinkya Rahane (captain), Venkatesh Iyer, Rinku Singh, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Andre Russell, Rovman Powell, Harshit Rana, Anukul Roy, Varun Chakaravarthy

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