Cakewalk for Knight Riders

Skipper Gambhir guides Kolkata to seven-wicket win after bowlers restrict Pune to 118

The ball sprang off the wicket,followed Manoj Tiwary as he moved to give himself room,and crashed into his glove,which had shot up to protect his face. By the time Callum Ferguson ran from point to pick up the ball,the batsmen had completed a run. Wayne Parnell hadn’t yet turned back from his follow-through to get back behind the stumps. Ferguson threw anyway,and the ball shot to the long on fence.

The fielders changed ends. Tiwary dabbed the first ball of Alfonso Thomas’s second over into the off side,and set off for another single. Ferguson collected again,threw again,hit the stumps this time,but gave away four more overthrows. An already dismal day for the Pune Warriors was quickly turning farcical. The final home game of a forgettable debut season was going to end in another heavy defeat.

Two overs later,a gentle push from Kolkata Knight Riders skipper Gautam Gambhir rocketed to the point boundary. The next ball,driven off the front foot,bounded into the cover fence. Fielding at slip,a man renowned for that kind of off-side strokeplay bent his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. Sourav Ganguly’s clash against his hometown franchise wasn’t going too well either.

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Ganguly managed to leave some sort of imprint on the game,pulling off a spectacular catch at mid off to send back Yusuf Pathan,but Kolkata were only two runs away from victory at that point. In the end,the Kolkata raced past Pune’s 118 with seven wickets and 20 balls to spare. Pathan made 29 to go with his spell of two for 23,and took the Man of the Match award. He also played the two best shots of the day,late cuts off successive balls from Rahul Sharma,scything his blade down on fast top-spinners inches in front of off stump and beating backward point both times. Gambhir,meanwhile,cantered to an unbeaten 46-ball 54.

Pune’s total was always going to be inadequate. The wicket wasn’t the most ideal to bat on,as evidenced by the degree of turn that Shakib Al Hasan extracted in getting rid of Ferguson,who was stranded down the track after missing the ball by nearly a foot. But it didn’t help the Warriors that most of their batsmen got out when they might have been on the verge of getting set six batsmen reached double figures,but the highest score was Yuvraj Singh’s 24.

The spinners got Kolkata off to a superb start. Jesse Ryder holed out to Pathan,and Manish Pandey was lbw to Iqbal Abdulla,failing to pick the arm ball. Ganguly enjoyed one trademark moment,dumping Abdulla over the long on fence,but scratched around for the rest of the time,and fell sweeping Shakib into short fine leg’s hands.

With the spinners enjoying so much success,Lakshmipathy Balaji had to wait till Pune’s final over to get his first bowl. He still ended up with two wickets – an effort ball forcing Yuvraj to top edge a pull and a yorker rearranging Sachin Rana’s stumps.