Heinrich Klaasen (69) and Ishan Kishan (55) made Punjab Kings pay a heavy price for their careless fielding, leading Sunrisers Hyderabad to a commanding 41-run victory and the top spot in the IPL standings.
After Punjab Kings decided to bowl, the two assisted in setting a difficult total of 235/4 in Hyderabad on Wednesday.
Punjab Kings’ reply was limited to 202/7, resulting in their third consecutive defeat and a drop to second place. Cooper Connolly put up a valiant fight for PBKS, scoring an incredible 107 not out from 59 balls (7×4, 8×6), but he had little help from the opposition.
Pat Cummins (2/34) and Shivang Kumar (2/45) were the primary wicket-takers for SRH.
Klaasen was dropped on 9 earlier, but he took most of the opportunity to hit four sixes and three fours in his 43-ball knock.
Kishan hit a quick 32-ball 55, comprising two fours and four sixes, after surviving two reprieves—a missed stumping and a dropped catch.
Yuzvendra Chahal was the most economical bowler for Punjab Kings, returning 1/32, but he had a miserable game because all of his missed stumping and missed opportunities came from his bowling.
The bowlers had nothing on the track, and Chahal’s 1/32 is priceless given that Shashank Singh lost a sitter and Prabhsimran Singh was unable to stump regularly, leaving him both upset and furious.
Three catches were dropped by Punjab Kings, whose outfielding throughout the tournament has been, to put it mildly, terrible.
Abhishek opened the floodgates with four maximums as the SRH batsmen hammered 17 sixes in all. While Kishan and the unmatched Klaasen, who was having his finest IPL season ever, each smashed four sixes, Head scored three.
Together, Jansen (0/61) and Arshdeep (1/43) conceded 100 runs in their eight overs. With three straight sixes off Vijaykumar Vyshak, Kishan shown flashes of his former best. His fifty was a patchy but very useful one.
Abhishek got one in the arc from Jansen early on and sent it flying over long-off. He then hit a maximum over long-on with another beautiful bat movement. He read the second one—a knuckle ball—from the hand since changing the pace didn’t work.
Abhishek attempted a fifth six after executing the swivel draw off Lockie Ferguson behind square to raise the team’s fifty, but this time the ball ballooned for Shreyas Iyer to complete the catch at short mid-off.
Head seized control when Abhishek was removed, as he scored two brilliant sixes over mid-wicket before failing to reach his third consecutive fifty by going for one shot too many.
