IPL 2020, KXIP v SRH: Who won yesterday's match?
A terrific bowling effort from the Kings XI Punjab unit, headlined by a fantastic 19th over from Englishman Chris Jordan, helped the KL Rahul-led side defend a 127-run target and pick up a 12-run win over the Sunrisers Hyderabad in the 43rd match of IPL 2020 at Dubai.
Set a relatively easy target for two important points, SRH got off to a top start with skipper David Warner and opening partner Jonny Bairstow putting on 52 runs at the end of the powerplay stages.
Warner, in particular, was the aggressor early on and raced away to an 18-ball 31, and collected another boundary before he gloved a googly from Ravi Bishnoi to KXIP skipper KL Rahul, and departed in the 7th over.
The Sunrisers lost a wicket each in the next two overs as Bairstow was castled around his legs by Murugan Ashwin, before young Abdul Samad perished for a 5-ball 7 courtesy of a well-judged catch from Chris Jordan off Mohammed Shami's bowling.
At the halfway stage, SRH needed 58 runs from the remaining 10 overs with their previous encounter's match-winning heroes Manish Pandey and Vijay Shankar occupying the crease.
Although the duo did play out quite a few dot balls, three boundaries off Shankar's blade in two overs left SRH needing just 30 runs off the last five overs. However, a stunning catch from substitute fielder Jagadeesha Suchith removed Pandey on the first ball of the 17th over, before Shankar edged one from Arshdeep into Rahul's mitts to sound alarms in the SRH camp.
Seasoned England seamer Chris Jordan delivered a terrific 19th over, removing Jason Holder and Rashid Khan off consecutive deliveries and gave away just three runs, leaving Priyam Garg and Sandeep Sharma 14 runs to get off the final six deliveries.
The 20th over saw SRH lose three wickets in just five balls as KXIP skittled out their opponents for just 114 from 19.5 overs, which saw the Rahul-led side pick up victory from the jaws of defeat.
Earlier, SRH skipper Warner won the toss and opted to put KXIP into bat first, and the bowlers delivered challenging lines and lengths that troubled the batsmen early on.
KXIP were forced to go in with a makeshift opening pair for the game with Mayank Agarwal sitting out due to an injury, which saw Mandeep walking out alongside Rahul for this encounter.
The openers found it hard to get going early on as they collected just 24 runs off the first four overs, before a six and a four off the 5th over bowled by Sandeep Sharma gave KXIP some momentum.
However, the SRH seamer dismissed Mandeep off the final ball of the same over bringing Chris Gayle out to the middle. The Jamaican picked up two fours off Holder's first over and nailed a pull for a six in the next over bowled by Rashid to get going nice and early.
However, runs were hard to come by after that positive start for Gayle and the burly southpaw holed out to Warner in the 10th over bowled by Holder, before Rashid's googly found a way through Rahul's prod which set KXIP on the backfoot.
With the top-order back in the hut at the start of the 11th over, the pressure was on the middle-order. And despite enough time for Glenn Maxwell to get his eye in and then go big, the Australian all-rounder's miseries continued in IPL 2020 as he fell for a 13-ball 12 in the 14th over.
The SRH bowlers stuck to their strengths and bowled to their fields, which in turn stemmed the run flow. Despite Nicholas Pooran's presence out in the middle, only two boundaries were scored off the last two overs, one each in the 19th and 20th overs.
Eventually, the consistency exhibited by the SRH bowlers meant that KXIP could never step on the gas and the Rahul-led side finished with 126/7 from their 20 overs.
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IPL 2020: KXIP v SRH, Who won man of the match yesterday?
Ahead of this game against the Sunrisers, Chris Jordan had picked up just two wickets from five matches in IPL 2020. And with the likes of Holder, Garg and Rashid more than capable of clearing the boundaries, Jordan was entrusted with the responsibility of leaving as many runs as he could for Arshdeep Singh to defend in the 20th over.
With SRH needing 17 runs off 12 balls, the Englishman gave away two singles off the first two balls. He then had Holder driving a full ball to Mandeep Singh at covers before a short of length ball was belted straight to Pooran at deep covers by Rashid.
SRH could only score one run off the next two balls as Jordan completed his quota with figures of 3/17. And for his fantastic bowling performance, Jordan was named as the Man of the Match in yesterday's IPL match.