T20 Cricket : KKR Overcome Late Wickets To Beat Lions

In an encounter billed as India vs Pakistan, Kolkata Knight Riders edged clumsy Lahore Lions by four wickets in the Champions League T20 at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium on Sunday. After all-sorts Sunil Narine (3 for 9) helped the IPL champions restrict Lions to 151 for 7, Robin Uthappa and captain Gautam Gambhir added 100 for the opening wicket to douse any remote hopes Lions might have had.

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Uthappa (46), Gambhir (60), Manvinder Bisla (6), Yusuf Pathan (11) , Ryan ten Doeschate (12) and Andre Russell (1) departed in quick succession to light up the Pakistani faces but the wickets came too late in the day as Suryakumar Yadav (14*) kept his cool to see the team home with three balls to go.

The team from across the border had a cloddish outing. First they were at least 20 short of what they should have scored and then a poor performance in the field made matters worse. A golden opportunity had presented itself for Lions in the sixth over when Aizaz Cheema, with a short-pitched delivery, had Uthappa lob an easy catch but Asif Raza dropped it running to his left from short fine-leg. Saad Nasim and Nasir Jamshed also brought their butter fingers into view. Had these opportunities were taken, the result could have been different.

However, the man who actually made the difference for KKR was Narine whose second spell that saw him take back-to-back wickets restricted Lions to a modest total. Left-arm chinaman Kuldeep Yadav also impressed on debut foxing the opposition batsmen throughout his spell (4-0-21-1).

Lions got off to a good start, thanks largely to Ahmed Shehzad who added 50 runs with Jamshed for the opening wicket. Shehzad was benefited by poor wicketkeeping from Bisla who missed two easy stumping chances when the batsman was on 19 and 32 respectively. Narine also dropped Shehzad on 37 at short fine leg off the bowling of left-arm chinaman Kuldeep Yadav. Shehzad went on to score 59.

The opening stand was broken by a brilliant throw from Russell who ran in from deep midwicket to throw the stumps down at the non-striker's end to send back Jamshed for 10. Captain Mohammad Hafeez and Shehzad departed in quick succession leaving the Pakistanis at 91 for 3 and Gambhir brought back Narine who put the batsmen under a spell straight away. He sent back Nasim (0) first and then in his next over accounted for Umar Siddiq (2) and Raza (1).

Things could have been disastrous for Hafeez's men if it weren't for Umar Akmal who got some big shots towards the end, making 40 off 24 balls that included two fours and six off Piyush Chawla in an over. Akmal got out off the last ball of the innings.

KKR, who won their first match against Chennai Super Kings, made two changes to their team, bringing in Uthappa in place of Manish Pandey and Kuldeep for Umesh Yadav. Lions also made one change, giving a game to Mustafa Iqbal in place of medium pacer Imran Ali.

Brief scores: Lahore Lions 151 for 7 (Shehzad 59; Narine 3 for 9) lose to Kolkata Knight Riders 153 for 6 in 19.3 overs (Gambhir 60; Cheema 2 for 42) by four wickets