Gaji
Kolkata Knight Riders 85 for 2 (Gambhir 35*, Tiwary 30*) beat Rajasthan Royals 81 (Balaji 3-15) by eight wickets
"Balaji, zara dheere chalo!" (Balaji, walk a little slowly) was the weep in 2004 when L Balaji charmed the Pakistan public with his ability and smile. Seven years later, post a career-threatening back problem, both the traits were visible tonight and Eden Gardens lap it up in pleasure as a Balaji-inspired Kolkata Knight Riders routed Rajasthan Royals on a slow pitch.
Balaji twisted a magical delivery to knock out the hazardous Shane Watson in his first spell before he return to torpedo the lower order. The release that took out Watson was one of the best, if not the best, release bowled by a seamer this Indian Premier League. It land on the good length around the middle stump line and jagged away stridently past the waft to hit the top of the off stump. Balaji screamed, his team-mates were fevered, and the crowd roared; everyone knew the significance of Watson's the sack, accentuate even more by the absence of Rahul Dravid and Johan Botha in the line-up. He later returns to take away Ajinkya Rahane with an incutter and had Ashok Menaria upper cutting to thirdman.
KKR Batsmen | R | B | 4s | 6s | SR | |
c R Taylor b S Tait | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0.00 | |
Manvinder Bisla (wk) | c A Raut b S Warne | 9 | 22 | 0 | 0 | 40.91 |
Gautam Gambhir (c) | not out | 35 | 35 | 3 | 0 | 100.00 |
Manoj Tiwary | not out | 30 | 26 | 4 | 1 | 115.38 |
Extras: | (b 0, lb 4, w 5, nb 2, p 0) | 11 | ||||
Total: | (2 wkts, 13.5 ovs) | 85 | RR:6.14 | |||
Did not bat: Yusuf Pathan, Eoin Morgan, Shakib Al Hasan, Iqbal Abdulla, Lakshmipathy Balaji, Brett Lee, Rajat Bhatia
Bowling: RR | O | M | R | W | Nb | Wd | ER |
Shaun Tait | 3.5 | 0 | 29 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 7.60 |
Shane Watson | 4 | 0 | 20 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 5.00 |
Shane Warne | 4 | 0 | 17 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 4.20 |
Siddharth Trivedi | 1 | 0 | 8 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 8.00 |
Amit Singh | 1 | 0 | 7 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 7.00 |
Batsmen | R | B | 4s | 6s | SR | |||||
Shane Watson | b L Balaji | 11 | 13 | 2 | 0 | 84.62 | ||||
Amit Paunikar (wk) | st M Bisla b I Abdulla | 15 | 15 | 2 | 0 | 100.00 | ||||
Faiz Fazal | run out (I Abdulla) | 3 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 75.00 | ||||
Abhishek Raut | run out (S Hasan/M Bisla) | 11 | 15 | 1 | 0 | 73.33 | ||||
Ashok Menaria | c R Bhatia b L Balaji | 21 | 17 | 1 | 1 | 123.53 | ||||
Ross Taylor | st M Bisla b Y Pathan | 6 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 66.67 | ||||
Ajinkya Rahane | b L Balaji | 6 | 9 | 0 | 0 | 66.67 | ||||
Shane Warne (c) | not out | 3 | 6 | 0 | 0 | 50.00 | ||||
Amit Singh | b S Hasan | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0.00 | ||||
Shaun Tait | b S Hasan | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 0.00 | ||||
Siddharth Trivedi | b B Lee | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 0.00 | ||||
Extras: | (b 0, lb 1, w 3, nb 1, p 0) | 5 | ||||||||
Total: | (10 wkts, 15.2 ovs) | 81 | RR:5.28 | |||||||
Bowling: KKR | O | M | R | W | Nb | Wd | ER |
| Brett Lee | 2.2 | 0 | 12 | 1 | 1 | 0 | 5.10 |
| Shakib Al Hasan | 4 | 0 | 21 | 2 | 0 | 0 | 5.20 |
| Lakshmipathy Balaji | 3 | 0 | 15 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 5.00 |
| Iqbal Abdulla | 3 | 0 | 18 | 1 | 0 | 1 | 6.00 |
| Rajat Bhatia | 1 | 0 | 4 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 4.00 |
| Yusuf Pathan | 2 | 0 | 10 | 1 | 0 | 2 | 5.00 |
