Coming off of two back-to-back defeats, the Chennai Super Kings returned home and back to their winning ways, giving the Kolkata Knight Riders their first loss of IPL 2024. CSK won the toss and elected to field first on a surface that was on the slower side, typical to pitches at Chepauk in seasons past.
In the end, KKR could only score 137 runs off their 20 overs for the loss of 9 wickets, even after racing to 56-1 in the powerplay. Ravindra Jadeja was critical in restricting the runs and picking up timely wickets, finishing his 4 over spell with figures of 3-18.
The chase was relatively easy for CSK who were in control the whole way. Ruturaj Gaikwad greturned to form, anchoring the innings with an unbeaten 67 off 58 balls. His partnership with Daryl Mitchell (25 off 19), put the home team in winning position before Shivam Dube came in and basically ended the match with a quick-fire 28 off 18. CSK won with seven wickets in hand and 14 balls to spare, which will help their nett run rate going forward.
CSK are now three for three at home but have yet to win a match on the road. At fourth on the table, they are still in a good position to make the top four this season. The Rajasthan Royals are the only team left in the IPL with an undefeated record, sitting in first place at 4-0.
Match Summary
Things looked good at the beginning for the Knight Riders, despite opener Phil Salt getting out first ball to Deshpande. Sunil Narine and Angkrish Raghuvanshi utilized the powerplay well, hitting six 4s and three 6s to end on 56-1 at the end of 6 overs.
It was then that Jadeja entered the bowling attack and turned the match heavily in favor of the Super Kings. He picked up three wickets in his first eight balls of the match, putting a massive dent in the KKR middle order.
First he sent back Raghuvanshi, who attempted a reverse sweep but missed and was caught right in front leg-before. Then then went on to get rid of Narine when he got him to slice a length ball straight to long-off. The third and final victim for Jadja was Venkatesh Iyer who popped one up to deep midwicket where Mitchell took a good diving catch. The three wickets meant KKR only managed 43 in the next nine overs after the powerplay.
The CSK spinners had not picked up a single wicket at Chepauk in the first two matches there this season. This wicket seemed more conducive to slower bowling, holding in the pitch and giving accurate bowlers the chance to pick up wickets.
With batsmen finding it hard to time the ball against the spinners, CSK could only score 137 in their 20 overs, leaving CSK with a run rate of less than 7 to deal with.
The CSK innings started off positively, as Rachin Ravindra and Gaikwad got their team off to a quick start. Ravindra scored 15 off just 8 balls before getting picked off at long-on by Varun Chakravarthy off the bowling of Vaibhav Arora.
Daryl Mitchell was promoted up the order to No. 3 and the move paid big dividends. He was able to hit Sunil Narine for a six and four immediately after the powerplay and keep the scoreboard ticking. Gaikwad and Mitchell scored 44 runs between the 6th and 12 overs and brought the asking run rate to below a run a ball.
From there, even though Mitchell fell, CSK never looked in trouble. Dube came in and hit Varun Chakravarthy for back-to-back sixes to continue his rich vein of form. He is currently the leading run scorer for CSK this season and has an incredible strike rate of 193.93 against all spinners.
Ultimately he couldn’t make it to the very end but Chennai was able to finish the match in the eighteenth over with Dhoni at the crease.
Next up for the Super Kings is the Mumbai Indian at the Wankhede Stadium on Sunday night.
