Cricket: "IPL 2009 Match No 23: Kolkata Knight Riders Vs Mumbai Indians"

Match No 23: Kolkata Knight Riders Vs Mumbai Indians

Kolkata Knight Riders have lost another match which was well under their control for major part of the game. They lost to Mumbai Indians by 9 runs in a tense finish at Buffalo park, East London.

Mumbai Indians won the important toss and elected to bat first. They lost Jayasuriya early for 6 and just 19 runs on the board. Harbhajan singh was promoted up the order as a pinch hitter, but he too coudnt say longer at crease as was out for 6 in 7 balls. Tendulkar who was playing a lone hand until then departed for a well made 34 of 30 balls with 3 fours and 2 lovely sixes. Nayar too followed him soon after and was out for 10 of 13 balls and score was reading 71 for 4 of 12 overs. Duminy with the help of Napier and Rahane took mumbai to a respectable score of 148 of their stipulated 20 overs. Duminy was unbeated on 52 from 37 balls with 4 sixes and one four. For Kolkata Ishanth, Dinda, Karthik, Agarkar, Gayle, hodge took one wicket each.

Kolkata had a disastrous start when Ganguly and Gayle were out without bothering the scorers and score was reading 8 for 2 in 2.2 overs. Then Hodge and Van Wyk steadied the innings with an excellent 91 runs partnership for 3rd wicket. But once van wyk was out for 32 of 35 balls wickets kept falling and pressure kept on building. Kolkata all of a sudden where on the downside and lost the match by 9 runs. Hodge played an excellent innings of 73 from 60 balls with 5 fours and 3 sixes. For mumbai Zaheer Khan took 3 wickets and was the most successful bowler.

Man of the match was awarded to JP Duminy for his classy innings of 52 from 37 balls with 4 sixes and one four.

Scores: Mumbai Indians 148 for 6 (Duminy 52*) beat Kolkata Knight Riders 139 for 6 (Hodge 73, Zaheer 3-31) by nine runs