Dubai: Punjab Kings trashed Chennai Super Kings by 6 wickets on Thursday in their final round-robin game in the Indian Premier League in Dubai. The victory gave PBKS an outside chance for enter the play-offs although they have to rely on results of the rest of the games and wait until Friday.
Punjab skipper KL Rahul struck demolishing a 98 off 42 balls helping his side chase down a total of 135 in 13 overs after their bowlers put on the splendid performance to restrict CSK to 134/6.
Rahul’s decision to ask Chennai bat was spot on as his bowler got the first phase of the job done in fine fashion. CSK rode on the knock of Faf du Plessis(76) to get something to hold on. The South African anchored the innings on a day when his partners were unable to gave him support to build good partnerships.
Ruturaj Gaikwad(12) and Moeen Ali went home inside the powerplay over. Robin Uthappa failed to capitalise on chances given to him going home on a single digit. Ambati Rayudu,who was a guest of a mere five balls and skipper MS Dhoni manged to get 12 off 15 balls. Punjab bowlers were good from start to finish with Arshdeep Singh(2/35), Chris Jordan(2/20) and Ravi Bishnoi(1/25) topping the charts. CSK though got to the total after a 67 run stand between Du Plessis and Ravindra Jadeja(15) although the former had the majority of the shares in the partnership.
In reply, it was the Punjab skipper who single handedly took every CSK bowlers to the cleaners despite his side losing wickets at the other end. Mayank Agarwal and youngster Sarfaraz Khan went home inside the powerplay while the hard hitting Shahrukh Khan got just 8. However, Rahul was playing in a different rhythm from his partners bringing up his half century in just 25 deliveries and remained unbeaten till the end to seal a crucial victory. A win within the 11th over would give a more improved net run rate to Punjab however, they already have bettered that than Mumbai Indians who have a game to play.
Brief Scores: Punjab Kings 139/4 in 13 overs( KL Rahul 92*, Aiden Makram 13 ; Shardul Thakur 3/28) bear Chennai Super Kings 134/6 in 20 overs( Faf du Plessis 76*, Ravindra Jadeja 15* ; Chris Jordan 2/20; Arshdeep Singh 2/35) by 6 wickets.
