Chennai Super Kings defeated Kolkata Knight Riders on Friday in IPL 2021 final. This is their 4th trophy and their first since 2018.
In 2020, we witnessed Chennai Super Kings go down. They were down and out in that season but right from the beginning of 2021, there is no glimpses of that season. It looked like a new team right from the beginning and it continued in the finals as well.
Right from the start, Chennai Super Kings dominated the match. When Morgan sent the team to bat first, Gaikwad and Du Plessis took on the bowlers right from ball one.
Shakib Al Hasan went for 33 while Shivam Mavi and Lockie Ferguson went for 32 and 56 respectively.
Gaikwad became the youngest to win the orange cap and he scored 32 today. Narine, who was once again economical, dismissed him and he went for 2/26.
After his dismissal, Uthappa played a brilliant cameo, scored 31 from 15 deliveries. He was followed by Moeen Ali, who dealt with boundaries, scored 37* from 20.
On the other end, Faf du Plessis was the closest spectator for what was happening. While others were playing big knocks, du Plessis, with no tension, made 86 from just 59. The team ended with 192 for 3 in their 20 overs.
Kolkata Knight Riders had a good start along with some good luck as well. Venkatesh Iyer was dropped by skipper Dhoni early in the innings. He went on to score yet another fifty in the tournament.
Shubman Gill, on the other hand, enjoyed a bit of luck when he mistimed the ball and that went on to hit the spider cam wire before reaching the ground. Though Rayudu caught that ball, it was not out as per rules. He scored a fifty as well.
The openers added 91 for the first wicket but after that none of the batters got to double figures. Shivam Mavi was the other one to get to a double figure mark.
Nitish Rana came in at number three as Rahul Tripathi injured himself while fielding. Rana didn’t last long.
Shakib Al Hasan, Dinesh Karthik and Eoin Morgan followed as well. Shardul Thakur had three wickets while Josh Hazlewood and Ravi Jadeja had two each.
In the end, Mavi showed his shot range and made a good cameo. He made use of poor deliveries from CSK bowlers in the end but it was just too late as Chennai Super Kings went on to win in the final over by 27 runs as KKR managed only 165 runs in their 20 overs.
