Kolkata Knight Riders captain Eoin Morgan is hopeful that the five-wicket win against Punjab Kings at the Narendra Modi Stadium on Monday will help them gain some momentum in the ongoing season of the Indian Premier League. KKR got off to a decent start as they won their opening match against SRH.
However, they veered off the track as they lost all their next five matches. But KKR were able to turn the tables against PBKS. KKR were brilliant with the ball as they restricted the opposition to a paltry score of 123 runs. Prasidh Krishna was the pick of the bowlers for KKR as he scalped 3-30 in his quota of four overs.
Morgan also heaped praise on his spinners – Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy. Narine returned with figures of 2-22 in his four overs whereas Varun took 1-24 in his quota of overs. Thus, KKR came up with a collective effort with the ball to put the break on PBKS innings.
On the other hand, there was another positive for KKR as their skipper Eoin Morgan returned back to form. Morgan scored an unbeaten knock of 47 runs off 40 balls to take his team over the line and was also awarded the Player of the Match. Rahul Tripathi continued to impress with the bat as the right-hander contributed with 41 runs from 32 balls.
Morgan also heaped praise on young fast bowler Shivam Mavi, who got the big wicket of Chris Gayle. Mavi conceded only 13 runs in his four overs and bowled an economical spell.
Eoin Morgan said in the post-match presentation, “Wins haven’t been easy to come by. Have worked incredibly hard. Today, along with a bit of luck, the performance was very impressive particularly with the ball upfront. When the wicket’s like that – from the 12th over of our innings, the ball was sliding on. Only his second game this season (Mavi). The match-up against Gayle was favourable. He bowled well in the last game and started well here. For him to make an impact is huge, credit to him. The advantage we have over most spinners is that our spinners are variation bowlers. They don’t rely on drift and turn. They control their lengths well and rely on a tiny amount of turn and today they were exceptional. Lot of time to go in the tournament. Hopefully today can kick-start something for us”.
KKR will aim to build upon this win and continue their good show in the coming matches. The Eoin Morgan-led team will next face DC at the same venue on 29th April.
