Kings XI win a thrilling match, then fall at the last hurdle

Email to a friend | Bookmark this page | Print this page

The Gulf-sponsored team, Kings XI Punjab, beat the Deccan Chargers by only one run in a vital match in the 2009 IPL tournament, then they lost to teh Chennai Super Kings by 24 runs in a disappointing performance

IPL Update.....

Further to the match highlighted below, the final game for the Kings XI Punjab was against the Chennai Super Kings. The Punjab Kings XI batted second and had to score only 117 runs to win and reach the semi-finals. But it was a disaster...they only managed 92 by the end of the 20th over, and so were eliminated from the competition.

The Deccan Chargers (who were beaten by the Kings XI ... see below) went on to win the final.

When I checked the IPL league table early on Sunday morning (17^th May), I realised that the Gulf-sponsored Kings XI Punjab team HAD to win today to have a chance of reaching the competition's semi-final stage.

The League table before the match

Gulf Logo displayed on boundary electronic boards

Hopefully they would still be buoyed-up after their win on Friday night against the league leaders, the Delhi Daredevils. However, today's game against the Deccan Chargers was going to be tough, especially as both teams needed to win to stay in contention for the semi-final places. Hopefully the DC players should be tired - they had little time to rest following their game the previous night which they beat the Kolkata Knight Riders in a nail-biting and energy-sapping match - with a 6 of the very last ball !

Adam Gilchrist won the toss and chose to field. The scoring rate for KXIP wasn't great and, worse still, they were losing their batsmen too easily.

Some of the Gulf VIP Guests enjoying the match

First Sohal was out to a straightforward catch, then Pomersbach was run out trying, quite unnecessarily, to get a second run off a mis-fielded ball. When he attempted to flick the ball over his shoulder, Katich was easily caught. Then the captain Yuvraj Singh, who, with Sangakkara had been applying a steadying hand, was bowled and by the half-way strategic time out the team looked like they were in trouble.

At full stretch to catch a hard-hit ball, preventing the boundary and taking the wicket

Sangakkara continued with good partnerships with Mota and then Pathan, but as they pressed to score more quickly they fell one by one. That left the bowlers Brett Lee and Piyush Chawla with a few balls to try to lift the score, however they could only reach 134 by the end of the 20-over innings. All we could hope for was an effective and aggressive attack from the fast bowler, Lee, but the Chargers' openers, Gilchrist and Gibbs, looked very steady as they scored run after run off the KXIP pace attack.

After getting Gilchrist stumped, a high five for Powar

Yuvraj then brought on Ramesh Power whose spin bowling immediately fooled Gilchrist (stumped behind by Sangakkara) and Sulman was clean bowled on the very next ball. With our hopes now raised the match proceeded, but Gibbs and Symonds built yet another strong partnership, taking the score to 73 for 2 in the 12^th over.

The ball (lower left) heading towards the boundary for 4

20Twenty cricket is nothing if not exciting and full of surprises. The match suddenly turned on its head in the space of 9 balls, as Yuvraj first had Gibbs caught then, at the start of his next over took the wickets of Symonds and Rao with successive deliveries - a hat trick! Now, with the Chargers' batting strength removed, we felt confident that a win was possible. Not so, as the hero of the Chargers' previous match, Rohit Sharma, scored run after run, especially in the 18^th and 19^th overs, which went for 18 and 15 runs, respectively . They were back on track for a win.

Yuvraj knew his bowling success was the turning point

Sangakkara leaps and twists to stump Symonds

Team co-owner, Preity Zinta, could not contain her excitement !

So, the last over started with only 11 runs of 6 balls needed to win. Pathan bowled to Sharma who scored 2, then hit over the boundary for 4. Now under a lot of pressure, Pathan bowled a wide, thus leaving only 4 runs off 4 balls for the win. Next ball, Sharma went for it, but missed completely and his leg stump went flying. Now, with 3 balls left and the key batsman out, could the Kings XI hold on? YES! Next ball RP Singh swung and missed, then he mis-hit the ball up into the sky for Pathan to catch him. 2 runs were scored off the last ball and the match ended with an exciting 1-run win for the Gulf team !

See the bail fly (left of photo). Another Charger is out

Celebrations up in the VIP gallery

Scorecards for the above match

Kings XI Punjab

Batsman	Status	Runs	Balls	4s	6s	S/R
Total	20 Overs	134
S Sohal	c RG Sharma b RP Singh	9	12	0	1	75.00
SM Katich	c PP Ojha b A Symonds	11	10	2	0	110.00
LA Pomersbach	run out	1	2	0	0	50.00
Yuvraj Singh	b Y Venugopal Rao	20	18	2	1	111.11
KC Sangakkara	c RJ Harris b RP Singh	56	43	4	1	130.23
WA Mota	c RJ Harris b TL Suman	12	19	0	0	63.16
IK Pathan	c HH Gibbs b RP Singh	17	11	2	0	154.55
B Lee	not out	0	5	0	0	0.00
PP Chawla	not out	1	1	0	0	100.00
RR Powar		0	0	0	0	0.00
S Sreesanth		0	0	0	0	0.00
Extras	B: 1, Lb: 0, Wd: 5, Nb: 1, Pen: 0

Deccan Chargers

Batsman	Status	Runs	Balls	4s	6s	S/R
Total	20 Overs	133
AC Gilchrist	st KC Sangakkara b RR Powar	23	13	4	1	176.92
HH Gibbs	c PP Chawla b Yuvraj Singh	26	35	3	0	74.29
TL Suman	b RR Powar	0	1	0	0	0.00
A Symonds	st KC Sangakkara b Yuvraj Singh	25	27	1	0	92.59
RG Sharma	b IK Pathan	42	26	3	3	161.54
Y Venugopal Rao	b Yuvraj Singh	0	1	0	0	0.00
DB Ravi Teja	run out	10	15	1	0	66.67
RJ Harris	not out	2	2	0	0	100.00
RP Singh	c IK Pathan b IK Pathan	0	2	0	0	0.00
Jaskaran Singh	not out	0	0	0	0	0.00
PP Ojha		0	0	0	0	0.00
Extras	B: 1, Lb: 0, Wd: 2, Nb: 2, Pen: 0