Robin Uthappa slammed 87 off 47 balls while Gautham Gambhir 62 off 46 balls as Kolkata Knight Riders thrashed Rising Pune Supergiant (RPS) by seven wickets at Maharashtra Cricket Association stadium in Pune to go top of the points table in the IPL 2017.
Robin Uthappa was smashed a aggressive 87 off 47 and Gambhir played a captain knock 62 off 46 balls to defeat Rising Pune Supergiant at MCA stadium in Pune. They shared a 158 runs (85balls) partnership for second wicket and make sure to pick a one sided win overs RPS by reaching 183 runs target as 11 balls to spare.
Before this KKR team's skipper Gautham Gambhir won the toss and elected to Bowl.
RPS's openers Ajinky Rahane and Rahul Tripathi gave outstanding start for their team as they score 65 runs within 8 overs. Rahul Tripathi diparts for 38 (23) in Piyush Chawla's bowling.
After getting a good start from opening pair it need to continue by middle order batsman and it also carried in that way as it needed by Ajinky Rahane (46 off 41 balls) and Skipper Steven Smith (51 off 37 balls), played a well needed innings for RPS team. After dismissal of Ajinky Rahane, MS Dhoni came out to bat at No. 4 spot and he played quick innings of 23 from just 11 deliveries, inclusive two sixes and a boundary.
Kuldeep Yadhav dismissed both MS Dhoni and Manoj Tiwari in the same over of 18th.
However, Steven Smith and Daniel Christion managed RPS to reach a defendable total 182 runs in their 20 overs.
RPS lost the game 3rd time despite scoring 180+ runs in a game while defending total.
Match Summery :
RPS : 182/ 5 in 20 overs. Steven Smith 51*, Ajinky Rahane 46,
Bowling : Kuldeep Yadhav 31/2 , Sunil Narine 34/1.
KKR : 183/3 in 18.1 overs. Rabin Uthappa 87, Gautam Gambhir 62.
Bowling : Jaydev Unadakat 26/1 (3 overs), D Christion 31/1 (4 overs).
KKR won by 7 wickets.
Man of the match : Rabin Uthappa 87 (47).
