Sharjah, Oct 7 (FN Agency) Scintillating bowling spells from Shivam Mavi (4/21) and Lockie Ferguson (3/18) helped Kolkata Knight Riders hand a heavy 86-run defeat to Rajasthan Royals, who were bowled out for 85 while chasing 172, in match 54 of IPL 2021 here on Thursday. With the win, KKR are firm fourth on the table with 14 points in 14 games and are the favourite to qualify for the Playoffs as they pushed their net run rate to +0.587. Mumbai Indians (run rate: -0.048), who are still in contention for the fourth spot, need a win by big margin in their last game against Sunrisers Hyderabad.
Royals finished seventh on the table in the season with 10 points in 14 games. Asked to bat first, KKR batters put 171/4 on the board as Subhman Gill starred with the bat as he scored a 44-ball 56 while Venkatesh Iyer (38 off 35) and Nitish Rana (21 off 14) made telling contributions as well. Chasing 172, RR’s fight virtually ended in the powerplay with four wickets gone for 12 runs. Shakib Al Hasan clean bowled Yashasvi Jaiswal (0 off 3) in the first over while Shivam Mavi dismissed Sanju Samson (1 off 4) in the next to leave RR at sea at 1/2. Express pacer Lockie Ferguson further pile on RR misery by removing Liam Livingstone (6 off 6) and Anuj Rawat (0 off 1) in the fourth over.
Shivam Dube (18 off 20) and Glenn Phillips (8 off 12) steadily added 20 runs for the fifth wicket to restart the RR run chase. However, the revival was short-lived as Mavi holed out both the batters in the eighth over. The seventh RR wicket came in no time as well with Varun Chakravarthy trapping Chris Morris lbw for a duck. Rahul Tewatia (44 off 36) fought a lone battle from there on but with no recognised batter to back him up, Royal never stood a chance. Ferguson picked his third wicket in Unadkat (6 off 5) while Chetan Sakariya (1 off 5) was ran out by Dinesh Karthik. Tewatia was the last wicket to fall as he was played down by Mavi.