IPL 6: Wily Narine foxes Daredevils into submission

Kolkata Knight Riders spinner Sunil Narine in conversation with Ravi Shastri at the prize distribution ceremony after being adjudged man of the match in the Indian Premier League match against Delhi Daredevils at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata on April 3. Narine finished with figures of 4/13 as the Knight Riders won by six wickets. (Photo: IANS)

It was a no-contest at the Eden Gardens last evening, and the fixture was a strikingly one-sided one. Chasing a modest (rather below par) score of 128, the Kolkata Knight Riders were off to a flying start but seemed interested in making heavy weather of the target in the middle overs before finally finishing things off quite comfortably.

The Knight Riders could not have asked for a better start to the proceedings. Gambhir won the toss and had no hesitation in sending the Daredevils in to bat, particularly when there was no indication of any dew and also when he had no idea of what a par score would be batting first.

And Lee proved his decision to be the correct one, steaming in the first ball and uprooting Chand’s off-stump with a peach of a delivery, the perfect ‘Lee delivery’ finally making a long-awaited appearance. Chand had no answer to that gem, and could do little more than walk back to the pavilion without troubling the scorers.

The Daredevils’ ship was somewhat steadied with Warner and Mahela trying to consolidate while, at the same time, scoring at a brisk pace. The duo added 44 for the second wicket before Warner was done in by the first ball he faced off Narine, a ball that turned sharply off the leg and took his outside edge; Kallis gratefully held on to the catch at slip.

After this, the Delhi batting was a nondescript affair, with none of the batsmen except Jayawardene managing a double-digit score. Jayawardene went on to score a fine 66, an aberration in an otherwise dismal batting performance. He was the prime reason behind Lee’s expensive figures, and seemed to have taken a fancy to him.

Manprit Juneja perhaps tried to do justice to his domestic T20 strike rate of 150-odd and attempted some wild slogs to little effect before he was dismissed for 8, with Laxmi Shukla taking a blinder.

Bhatia and Balaji, with their clever change of pace, shared 3 wickets between them for almost nothing and provided the perfect platform for Gambhir to unleash his trump card, Narine, on the Delhi batters. It is interesting to note that he used Narine as an attacking option, saving three of his overs for the very end. The Daredevils had no answer for his variations, both in terms of spin as well as pace. He finally ended up scalping 4 wickets.

The Kolkata batting began in an uncharacteristic way, with the otherwise belligerent Bisla, their hero of IPL 2012, letting Pathan’s first over pass off as a maiden. Bisla seemed to struggle a bit before he was finally done in by Nehra, a leading edge pocketed by a running Chand.

After that, Kallis and Gambhir got together and scored at a brisk pace and tried to take the attack to the opposition. It was difficult to see how Gambhir was only recently left out of the national side on the grounds that he was out of form. He seemed in perfect nick, using his feet against the pacers to get to the pitch of the ball, driving through covers and over the infield as well in trademark Gambhir style.

Their partnership was cut short by Shahbaaz Nadeem off his second delivery itself when Kallis pulled a short delivery straight into the hands of Chand at deep midwicket. This did slow things down, but the plot was already lost for DD by then. The Knight Riders lost two more wickets. Gambhir was trapped in front by Botha for 42; however, the benefit of doubt could have been given to the batsman as the ball seemed to be going down leg. Manoj Tiwary was dismissed trying to paddle sweep Nadeem, but only managed to scoop the ball up in the air with Ojha doing the rest. However, there was no further setbacks for KKR as they achieved the target without losing any more wickets with 8 balls to spare.

KKR will pick up the first points of the tournament thanks to a very clinical performance by both batsmen and bowlers.

Bollywood megastar Shahrukh Khan and actress Deepika Padukone going around the Eden Gardens after Kolkata Knight Riders’ victory over Delhi Daredevils in the sixth Indian Premier League opener in Kolkata on April 3, 2013. (Photo: IANS)

Meanwhile, DD will hope that Sehwag is available for the next encounter to add to their arsenal at the top of the batting order.

The required run rate was a comfortable 6-about throughout the KKR innings, but they could have finished things off an over or two earlier and improved their net run-rate.

Who knows, maybe they were buying time to accommodate more TV ads.

Sunil Narine was awarded the man of the match for his miserly spell of 4-0-11-4.