It what could be termed as a fantabulous performance ever watched in the history of Indian Premier League of 2022 seasons, the match between Lucknow Super Giants and Kolkata Knight Riders held on Wednesday was nothing but a nail-biting clash to witness. Lets look at LSG vs KKR Match Summary.
As the second innings progressed to its end, the audience saw an action-packed performance from both the batsmen and bowlers. The Dr DY Patil Sports Academy, Mumbai, reverberated with fans unceasingly shouting for their teams.
The commentary box too witnessed a similar scenario as and when the wickets were falling and runs getting added to the scoreboard through more number of boundaries. The flags of LSG and KKR were flying high in the air, the gesture showed by the spectators to encourage their beloved teams to win.
The match has all began with LSG’s super knock batting performance. The openers, Quinton de Kock and KL Rahul, showed a dominating batting style failing Kolkata bowlers from plucking one single wicket. The first innings was completely built by these two batsmen scoring 210 runs in 20 overs. De Kock added century to his scorecard and missed scoring half-century by just 10 runs.
By the end of the innings, this South African cricketer scored 140 runs off 70 balls by hitting 10 sixes and 10 fours. Similarly, Rahul’s supportive batting drove LSG to reach a gigantic score without losing any wicket.
Meanwhile, in the second innings, the KKR’s top-order batsmen struggled to score any runs. Venkatesh Iyer went for a golden duck and Abhijeet Tomar left the crease for a single-digit number of 4. However, Nitish Rana and Shreyas Iyer brought the team on track with fight-back performance helping KKR to go forward.
Despite severe efforts, the Shreyas Iyer-led team was lacking a magical performance as the match was reaching to close. Andre Russell took pavilion route by scoring only five runs. It was Rinku Singh who fulfilled the requirement by scoring 40 runs in 15 balls. At a point, Rinku completely took over on LSG and was slowly heading towards achieving the target.
In the last over, KKR required 21 runs to win and Rinku was seemingly in a position to pull off the game away from LSG. After hitting one four and two sixes, Rinku was dismissed by Marcus Stoinis in a stunning catch by Evin Lewis in deep point. This dismissal was a match-turning point with LSG registering a two-run win.
Speaking during the post-match presentation, KKR skipper Shreyas Iyer said I am not feeling sad at all. “That was one of the best games of cricket I have ever played. The way we showed our character and attitude was outstanding. Loved the way Rinku got us to the end and it was unfortunate he could not finish the game in the end,” he said.
LSG captain KL Rahul said the players have missed games like this. “There haven’t been a lot of games that have gone down to the last ball. Happy to be on the other side of the result. We could have so easily been on the losing side and gone back home thinking we lost this game by playing some poor cricket in the middle. It’s a good way to finish the last game of the group stages,” he said, adding that it was an unbelievable game.
Player of the match:
Quinton de Kock (LSG) – 140 (70) Not Out.