The Chennai Super Kings ended a four-game losing run and defeated the Kolkata Knight Riders, denying them any hope of making it to the IPL 2025 playoffs.
Ajinkya Rahane and Sunil Narine assisted KKR during the pitch limitations as they chose to bat first. KKR was left reeling as Noor Ahmad (4 for 31) hit twice in his opening over. Rahane was defeated by Ravindra Jadeja (48 off 33), but Andre Russell (38 off 21) was strong enough to win. Despite all of the starters, KKR was only able to muster 179, a total that their captain later deemed below average.
On the other side, CSK encountered difficulties right away. IPL rookie Urvil Patel (31 off 11) was unfazed by the fact that both of their openers were out for ducks. During his brief stint, Patel hit an incredible four sixes. After R Ashwin’s attempt to climb to No. 4 failed, Varun Chakravarthy (2 for 18) ended Jadeja’s tenure. In the powerplay, half of the CSK team was back in the hut.
Throughout the middle overs, Chakravarthy and Narine kept up their pressure, with Shivam Dube (45 off 40) and Dewald Brevis (52 off 25) cruising along. Brevis discovered what had to give. Brevis dismantled Vaibhav Arora for 30 runs in the eleventh over to ease the burden on CSK, while KKR needed 87 runs from the final 10 overs.
KKR though, didn’t go down without a fight as Chakravarthy snared Brevis and the bowlers kept a tight leash on a struggling Dube and MS Dhoni.
Dube was eventually able to find the fences at the right time to keep CSK inching closer to victory, while Dhoni and Anshul Kamboj saw them through in the last over.
Here are the most important numbers from the game
3 – The Eden Gardens in Kolkata is now the third stadium to host 100 IPL matches. The other two are the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai (124) and the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru (100).
9 – Ajinkya Rahane became the ninth player overall, and the seventh Indian, to breach the 5000-run mark in the IPL.
1 – With 141, Ravindra Jadeja is now CSK’s highest wicket-taker in the IPL going past Dwayne Bravo’s 140.
1 – MS Dhoni is now the first wicketkeeper to effect 200 dismissals with the gloves in the IPL. The now-retired Dinesh Karthik is a distant second with 174, and at an even more distant third is another retiree – Wriddhiman Saha with 113. Rishabh Pant with 100 rounds up the list of wicketkeepers with 100 dismissals in the IPL.
12 – This game was the twelfth instance of both openers of the same team making ducks in an IPL match. With CSK, it had happened only once before. Both Stephen Fleming and Parthiv Patel had departed without adding to the score against RR at Jaipur in 2008.
2 – Vaibhav Arora became only the second KKR bowler to concede 30 or more runs in an over in the IPL. Moeen Ali had become the first in KKR’s previous fixture.
1 – Varun Chakravarthy completed the milestone of 100 wickets in the IPL. By the number of matches taken, Chakravarthy is the joint-fastest spinner to the milestone. Chakravarthy got there in 83 matches, the same number taken by Amit Mishra and Rashid Khan. Yuzvendra Chahal with 84 and Sunil Narine with 86 matches respectively are in tow.
2 – Chakravarthy is also the joint-second fastest Indian player to 100 IPL wickets by matches. The top spot is shared by Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Harshal Patel who took 81 matches each while Chakravarthy’s number of 83 is matches by Mishra and Ashish Nehra. Chahal and Sandeep Sharma (87) are next in line.
1 – MS Dhoni became the first player to register 100 not outs in the IPL. Ravindra Jadeja with 80 is a distant second.
2018 – The last time CSK successfully chased a target of 180 or more in the IPL. They lost all 12 such matches ever since before registering a win in this game.
2 – KKR ultimately squandered an opportunity to complete the season double over CSK, i.e., beat them in both league stage matches in a single season. RCB registered their first season double over CSK in their last match, this now leaves KKR and SRH as the only existing franchises without a season double over CSK.
India
