Kolkata Knight Riders have ended their 12-year-long hoodoo at the Wankhede Stadium against Mumbai Indians as they registered a rare win against the five-time champions at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on Friday, May 3.
The Shreyas Iyer-led side outclassed Hardik Pandya's MI on a challenging surface of the Wankhede Stadium. Batting first KKR managed to make 169 in 19.5 overs as their batters bore the brunt of the two-paced surface. But Venkatesh Iyer and Manish Pandey stood tall in the dire circumstances to take the team to a competitive total. Iyer, who was long pending for a notable knock for the Knight Riders this season, finally arrived with a score of 70 from 52 balls. Manish, who came in as an impact sub, made 42 from 31 deliveries.
The bowlers set-up a brilliant win for the visitors in the second innings. Mitchell Starc's four-wicket haul, and two wickets each from Varun Chakaravarthy, Sunil Narine and Andre Russell helped the Knight Riders win the contest by 24 runs. This is KKR's first win over MI at the Wankhede Stadium aftwer 12 years. Their last win against them came wat back in 2012.
Mumbai Indians lost Ishan Kishan early in the second over when Mitchell Starc made an early strike by cleaning up the MI opener. Rohit Sharma and Naman Dhir could not contribute much and fell for identical scores of 11 each with MI in hole at 46/3 They went into deeper trouble with the departure of Tilak Varma, Nehal Wadhera and Hardik Pandya - MI were reeling at 71/6 in 11.2 overs. Hardik, who had a good day in the bowling, could not make it a decent day with the bat as he was dismissed for one run.
Suryakumar Yadav inflicted the impetus and the much-needed hope into the hosts camp as he made a stroke-filled 56 from 35 balls. But when he fell in the 16th over with MI still needing 50 more, the pendulum swung in favour of the visitors. Tim David held one end up and tried taking the team over the line. MI needed 32 from the last over of Starc and it was way too much even for David as he fell after hitting the first ball for a six. Starc was on a hat-trick as he removed Piyush Chawla on the next ball but Jasprit Bumrah saved the hat-trick only for Gerald Coetzee to be bowled out on the next ball.
