By Sirshendu Panth, IANS,
Kolkata: Putting up an all-round impressive show, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) cruised to an eight-wicket win over Kings XI Punjab to move atop the Indian Premier League (IPL) points table here Saturday.
Cheered on by a large crowd at the historic Eden Gardens, the Knights restricted the Kings to 119/6 and then cantered to their target with 16 balls to spare to record their fifth overall and second back-to-back win in the tournament.
Gautam Gambhir (45 not out off 44 balls, 4×4) hit a boundary to level the scores and then set off for a single off leg-spinner Piyush Chawla to take the knights to 120/2 in 17.2 overs and bolster their points kitty to 10 from eight games.
Mumbai Indians also have the same points but have played a match less. On the other hand, the Kings remained on six from the same number of matches.
The KKR’s convincing batting display centred around an unfinished 85-run third wicket stand between skipper Gambhir and Manoj Tiwary (34 not out off 42 balls, 3×4, 1×6) after Jacques Kallis (1) departed cheaply while Eoin Morgan (28; 15 balls, 6×4) – promoted as an opener – played a short cameo.
Kings XI pacer Bharghav Bhatt (2/22) took the wickets.
Gambhir and Tiwary never seemed in undue hurry, as they paced their innings well, rotating the strike frequently and clobbering the loose deliveries to the fence on the slow wicket where run scoring was not easy.
They never let the asking rate go up and in the end it was another empahtic win for the Knights, the only side to have never made it to the IPL semifinal in the earlier three editions of the league.
Earlier, put in to bat, Kings XI started off badly, losing their top order before even half of the scheduled overs were bowled.
Skipper Adam Gilchrist struck 26 off 27 balls, helped by three fours and one six, while Paul Valthaty (7), S. Marsh (5) and Abhishek Nayar (0) went back cheaply. The visitors were 53/4 in 9.2 overs.
Dinesh Kaarthick (42) then stitched together a 33-run stand with David Hussey (15) and 31 runs with bipul Sharma (15) to carry his side to a modest total.