Shakib’s KKR clinch second IPL title

Sports Desk: Bangladesh ace all-rounder Shakib Al Hasan starrer Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) won the seventh Indian Premier League (IPL) title, second time in three years, beating Kings XI Punjab by 3 wickets on Sunday.

Batting first at M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore Pubjab scored 199 for 4 wickets with a magnificent unbeaten century from Wriddhiman Saha.

In replay, KKR reached the target for 7 wickets with 3 balls to spare.

Kings XI Punjab’s right-hand batsman Wriddhiman Saha smashed his maiden T20 century and was unbeaten on 115 runs off 55 balls with 10 fours and 8 sixes.

His teammate Manan Vohra contributed 67 runs off 52 balls with 6 fours and 2 sixes. The duo added 129 runs off 72 balls in third wicket partnership.

Shakib Al Hasan let the opponent collect only 26 runs in his 4 overs at an economy rate of 6.50 while other KKR bowler were much expensive.

Chasing a huge target of 200 runs, KKR lost their in-form batsman Robin Uthappa in the very first over. But young Manish Pandey smashed a 94 runs off 50 balls with 7 fours and 6 sixes to make the chase easy.

Yusuf Pathan (36), Gautam Gambhir (23) and Shakib Al Hasan (12) contributed to surpass the huge total.

But it was spinner Piyush Chawla who earned the victory for KKR scoring unbeaten 13 runs off 5 balls with a boundary and over boundary under pressure at the end.

Earlier, KKR won the title first time in 2012 whereas it was the first final for the Kings XI Punjab.

After the match, Shakib said it was a fantastic feeling to win the IPL title 2 times in 3 years.

risingbd/June 2, 2014/Augustin Sujan