Shakib, Uthappa keep KKR in top four

Cricket365
May 20, 2014

The Kolkata Knight Riders did no damage to Chennai's play-off chances on Tuesday, winning by eight wickets against the Super Kings, but did widen the gap between the top and bottom four with just a few games to go.

Chennai batted first, all but assured of the knock out place, and scored a below-par 154 for four thanks largely to Suresh Raina's half ton. Kolkata reached that with two overs to spare after Robin Uthappa and Shakib-al-Hasan did the job.

Kolkata won the toss and elected to field, preferring to chase given Uthappa's sublime recent for and Chennai's defeat in their previous game. CSK lost Dwayne Smith for five early on, to Pat Cummins.

Brendon McCullum and Raina then batted for the next nine overs and pushed the score to 60, before the New Zealand skipper was removed by Sunil Narine for 28 off 24 balls. Faf du Plessis then joined Raina.

They added 62 runs in the next six overs, with Raina continuing to target the bowlers. He was eventually out for 65 off 52 balls to Piyush Chawla, having struck five sixes. Du Plessis was removed an over before, for 23.

After MS Dhoni's 21 not out pushed the score past 150, the Kolkata bowlers would have been pleased regardless, as none aside from Chawla went for more than 7.50 to the over.

Kolkata's chase was a simple one thanks to Uthappa and Gautam Gambhir's opening stand of 64 in seven overs, with Gambhir the anchoring partner. He made just 21 of those runs before falling to Ishwar Pandey, bowled.

Uthappa then continued with Manish Pandey, crunching 10 fours and a six in his knock of 67, using up just 39 balls. He was bagged in the 12th over, but Pandey and Shakib romped to the target, with Shakib scoring 46 not out off 21 balls.