Under the leadership of stand-in captain Sam Curran, Punjab Kings took on Shreyas Iyer-led Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in match 42 of the Indian Premier League 2024 (IPL 2024) on Friday, April 26 at Eden Gardens. in Calcutta.
By opting to bowl first in the match, KKR openers Phil Salt and Sunil Narine made the Punjab Kings bowlers look clueless. Salt and Narine smashed 75 and 71 runs respectively, while Shreyas Iyer, Venkatesh Iyer and Andre Russell made significant contributions to help KKR score 261 for 6 on the board. For PBKS, Arshdeep Singh picked two wickets, while Sam Curran, Harshal Patel and Rahul Chahar picked up one wicket each.
Chasing the target, Jonny Bairstow and Prabhsimran Singh destroyed the KKR bowling unit. Singh failed to hit big, but Jonny Bairstow turned his fifty into a three-figure score and, along with Shashank Singh, led PBKS to an 8-wicket victory. This was the highest ever chase in the history of T20 cricket.
Speaking after the match, Sam Curran expressed his delight at the victory and said that cricket is becoming like baseball. Sam Curran said:
“Very happy. The most important thing is the victory. Cricket is becoming baseball. We’ve had some tough weeks. But we stuck it out. The way the boys train. The confidence and the coaches. The small fields and the dew. The reviews that could give you an extra ball.”
Sam Curran further praised Jonny Bairstow for his stellar knock and termed Shashank Singh and Ashutosh Sharma as the find of the tournament. Sam Curran stated:
“We stood firm and managed to chase him with balls to spare. I’m happy for Johnny. What an incredible knock. Shashank Singh has been the find of the tournament for us. Ashutosh too. Proud of everyone.”
Previous 5 meetings between KKR and PBKS
In the previous 5 meetings between the teams, Kolkata Knight Riders won three and Punjab Kings won two matches. On 8 May 2023, KKR restricted PBKS to 179/7 and then chased down the target to win the match by 5 wickets.
Before that, in the same season on April 1, Kolkata Knight Riders posted 191/5 on the board and stopped KKR at 146/7 to win by 7 runs as the target was reduced to 154 as per DLS method.
In the 2022 Indian Premier League, KKR and PBKS faced each other only once on April 1 at Wankhede where KKR defeated their opponents by 6 wickets with 33 balls to spare while chasing 138 runs. Talking more about the rivalry, Punjab Kings defeated Knight Riders on October 1 in Dubai by 5 wickets as they successfully completed the chase of 166 and in the same season, KKR recorded a 5-wicket win over the franchise based in Punjab in April. 26 in Ahmedabad as they exhaustively chased the small target of 123/9.