Kolkata Knight Riders wins IPL 7 Title: Kings XI Punjab Wins Many Hearts
Nobody has any expectation on Kolkata to reach to the play-off as it won only two matches in the first seven league matches it played. In the last league match, it needed 161 runs in 15.2 overs to reach the play-offs. This also looked impossible but Kolkata achieved this in only 14 overs and reached play-off. In qualifier match, the team defeated Punjab by 28 runs and reached finals.
Bangalore: Finally, Kolkata Knight Riders on their second IPL title. They defeated the Punjab team which reached final with highest number of wins. Kolkata won the title in 2012 for the first time. This is the second title for them. In the final match that was played in Chinnaswamy stadium in Bangalore, Kolkata defeated Punjab by 3 wickets.
Punjab was asked to bat first by Kolkata who won the toss. Sehwag was out for only 7 runs. Bailey also failed. In the first ten overs, Punjab’s score was only 58 runs in the first ten overs. From the next over, Saha started hitting the ball. His first six came in the bowling of Shakib. Chawla, Narien also could not restrict these batsmen. He played big shots without any fear of getting out probably thinking that there are Maxwell and Miller after him in the batting line up. He returned to pavilion in the 17th over. He tried to reverse swipe the very first ball and was out. Later Miller came to join Saha. In the last ten overs Punjab scored 141 runs set the target of 200 runs for Kolkata.
Kolkata lost the wicket of Uthappa for only 5 runs. Pandey and Gambhir tried to score runs quickly. T the end of powerplay, Kolkata scored 59 runs. Though Gambhir was out, Yousuf Pathan took over the responsibility of making the score board run. In 13 overs, the team scored 128 runs and the target appeared easy for them. The match took a turn when Pathan was out. Kolkata lost next two wickets also quickly. Pandey scored 31 runs in 10 balls after Pathan was out. In the last 7 balls Kolkata needed 11 runs to win the title. With Chawla hit a six in the last ball of 19th over which turned the match. Kolkata needed only 5 runs in the last over. Chawla hit a boundary in the third ball and Kolkata was ready for celebrations.
