SRH vs KKR: Varun Chakaravarthy led Kolkata Knight Riders' bowlers to script a stunning comeback win in the 47th match of IPL 2023 as KKR beat Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium. Chasing a score of 171, SRH were cruising away with the win but the KKR bowlers applied breaks to the home side's batting and registered a 5-run win.
With their back against the walls, Chakaravarthy helped KKR make a brilliant comeback. SRH needed 38 runs in the final 30 balls and had their captain Aiden Markram well set in the middle. However, in the final 5 overs, Chakaravarthy bowled three of them and went for only 8 runs, while picking up a wicket of Abdul Samad in the final over.
SRH needed 9 runs off the final over. Shardul Thakur had an over-up his sleeves. But Captain Nitish Rana decided to go with Chakaravarthy. The spinner gave just 2 runs in the first two balls and then got Samad out at deep mid-wicket on the third ball. The new batter Markande scored only 1 run in the next two balls and Bhuvneshwar played a dot on the final ball as SRH completed a famous win.
Earlier, Thakur got the wicket of Klaasen in the 15th over, whereas Vaibhav got rid of Markram in the 17th. In between Chakaravarthy bowled some tight overs to choke Hyderabad.
In the first innings, Kolkata scored 171. Nitish Rana and Rinku Singh powered KKR to a fightable total. Both missed the half-centuries but made enough for KKR to give a decent score to their bowlers. Rana finished at 42 off 31 balls and Rinku made 46 off 35 balls.
SRH's Playing XI:
Mayank Agarwal, Abhishek Sharma, Aiden Markram (c), Heinrich Klaasen (wk), Harry Brook, Abdul Samad, Marco Jansen, Mayank Markande, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Kartik Tyagi, T Natarajan
KKR's Playing XI:
Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), Jason Roy, Venkatesh Iyer, Nitish Rana (c), Andre Russell, Rinku Singh, Sunil Narine, Shardul Thakur, Vaibhav Arora, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy
