Mumbai Indians outclass Kolkata Knight Riders by 102 runs

Agencies
May 10, 2018

New Delhi: The resurgence of defending champions Mumbai Indians continued as they outclassed Kolkata Knight Riders by a massive 102 runs margin at the Eden Gardens on Wednesday. After registering their fourth victory in the last five games, Mumbai jumped to fourth in the 2018 Indian Premier League standings with 10 points.

Mumbai bowled out KKR for 108 in 18.1 overs, after setting a mammoth 211-run target to push down their opponents to fifth in the leaderboard. Mumbai increased their winning-streak against KKR to eight as they fashioned their 18th win in 22 matches against their 'bunny'.

After Ishan Kishan (62 off 21 balls) powered Mumbai to 210/6, Pandya brothers - Krunal (2/12) and Hardik (2/16) led the impressive bowling attack to register their biggest win against KKR in eleven seasons.

KKR endured a terrible start to the massive run chase as they lost Sunil Narine in the second ball of the innings to Mitchell McClenaghan. Chris Lynn (21 off 15 balls) kept the scoring rate high by hitting a six and three fours, before a mix-up with Robin Uthappa on the last ball of the fourth over ended his stay in the middle.

The hosts slipped further when young spinner Mayank Markande struck in his first over to dismiss big-hitting Robin Uthappa (14) as KKR struggled to 51/3 after seven overs.

KKR kept losing wickets at regular intervals as the asking rate climbed rapidly with every over bowled.

Andre Russell (2) was the next to depart as he was caught by Markande at extra cover off Hardik. The situation became worse for the home side in the tenth over, as they lost in-form skipper Dinesh Karthik to another run out dismissal and Hardik topped it with the wicket of Nitish Rana (21) in the next delivery. The chase was in all sense over at the halfway mark as KKR reached 72/6.

Two balls later, Jasprit Bumrah scalped Rinku Singh for his first wicket of the day. After a lull of 3.2 overs, during which KKR scored 17 without losing any wicket, Ben Cutting dismissed Piyush Chawla (11) to hasten the hosts' downfall. Krunal Pandyathen completed the rout with the wickets of Tom Curran (18) and Kuldeep Yadav.

Earlier, Ishan smashed a 17-ball half-century, the joint second fastest of the season with Narine, as Mumbai overcame a slow start to post an imposing 210/6.

Ishan tore apart KKR bowling, especially Kuldeep Yadav who was clobbered for four consecutive sixes, en route to his 21-ball 62 (5x4, 6x6) as MI scripted a turnaround in the middle overs.

The momentum shifted in favour of MI in the 14th over that yielded 25 runs with Ishan making a mockery of chinaman Kuldeep's bowling. The bulk of Mumbai's runs -- 148 -- came from boundaries. MI scored 73 runs in five middle overs to reach 145/3 in 15 overs from being a modest 72/2 midway into their innings.

After Ishan, it was Cutting show as he hit the first three balls of the final over for a six each en route to his nine-ball 24 (1x4, 3x6) as MI finished on a high with 22 runs in the final over bowled by Piyush Chawla.

Kuldep retrurned most expensive with 43 runs from his three overs, followed by Chawla who took 3/48 but was at his expensive best.

But the picture looked different midway into MI's innings with Narine (1/27) giving KKR the initial edge after Karthik opted to chase.

Openers Suryakumar Yadav (36) and Evin Lewis (18) once again gave MI a flying start with the KKR pace trio of Andre Russell, Prasidh Krishna and Tom Curran leaking 24 runs in the first three overs.

As has been their ploy, Narine came inside the powerplay and cleverly deceived the batsmen with his guile to restrict the run flow with nine runs from his first two overs. Narine set up the stage for an ordinary-looking Chawla to give the breakthrough in the sixth over as the desperate Mumbai batsmen looked to break free against the leg-spinner who accounted for both the openers. Mumbai were 62/2 inside nine overs.

But then came Ishan who hit top gear, dealing with only fours and sixes in his whirlwhind half-century.

Brief Scores: Mumbai Indians 210/6 (Ishan Kishan 62; Piyush Chawla 3/48) beat Kolkata Knight Riders 108 all out in 18.1 overs (Chris Lynn 21; Krunal Pandya 2/12)

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Agencies
February 23,2020

Madrid, Feb 23: Lionel Messi scored four goals and Barcelona reclaimed the top spot in the La Liga as Real Madrid suffered a surprise defeat by Levante last night, a week before the Clasico.

Madrid's nightmare afternoon was made worse by another injury to Eden Hazard, who was forced off in the second half of their 1-0 defeat in Valencia and is now doubtful to face Manchester City on Wednesday in the Champions League.

"It doesn't look good," said Real coach Zinedine Zidane afterwards.

Messi, meanwhile, ridiculed talk of a goal drought by scoring four against Eibar after four games without one, while emergency signing Martin Braithwaite made two assists off the bench, teeing up Messi and then Arthur Melo in injury-time.

Their 5-0 rout, coupled with Madrid's defeat, means Barca move back to the summit of La Liga, two points ahead of Zidane's side ahead of next Saturday's showdown at the Santiago Bernabeu.

It amounts to a considerable shift in momentum, with Barcelona away at Napoli in the first leg of the Champions League last 16 on Tuesday.

Madrid host City a day later and the plan had been for Hazard to regain form and fitness in what was only his second start since returning from three months out with a broken right foot.

But the Belgian sat in the dug-out with an ice pack around the same foot after going off and Zidane suggested it was a repeat injury after the match. "It can be weak where you've had an injury," he said.

For Madrid, playing catch-up again next weekend will be a particularly heavy psychological blow, especially given the series of off-field problems engulfing Barcelona in recent weeks.

Yet on the pitch, Messi showed no sign of distraction as the 32-year-old completed the second fastest of his now 36 league hat-tricks, after less than 40 minutes at Camp Nou.

"There's nothing left to do but stand up and applaud," Eibar wrote on Twitter afterwards.

"I won't wash my kit after hugging Messi," said Braithwaite.

Braithwaite's arrival from Leganes drew criticism after Barcelona capitalised on a curious La Liga rule that allows clubs to sign outside of the transfer window if they have lost a player to serious injury.

Brilliant Messi

Messi quickly got to work, scoring a brilliant first goal in the 14th minute after collecting the ball centrally, around 30 yards out. He had three Eibar defenders in front of him but found a way through, nutmegging Anaitz Arbilla before chipping delicately into the corner.

The second came in the 37th minute as Sergio Busquets found Arturo Vidal, who feathered a flick into Messi's path. Messi surged forward, past his stumbling opponents, and fired in.

His third, three minutes later, was the simplest of the trio and arrived only after he tried to play in Antoine Griezmann. His generosity was rewarded as a sloppy Griezmann touch meant the ball cannoned back to Messi, who apologetically poked in.

Coach Quique Setien was able to take Griezmann off with 18 minutes left and introduce Braithwaite for his debut. Braithwaite's first contribution was a skewed cross but things improved immeasurably from there, as two passes across goal gave Messi his fourth and Arthur his first.

Madrid were never in control of a chaotic contest against Levante but might have taken the lead if Hazard had done better with a long ball over the top from Marcelo, which he failed to control and then scuffed into the hands of Aitor Fernandez.

He limped off and Madrid lost their way, finally punished with 11 minutes left by a straight ball through to Morales. Luka Modric, exposed on the right side of Madrid's defence, was unable to recover and Morales caught Courtois by surprise by firing early past the goalkeeper and into the top corner.

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News Network
April 14,2020

Karachi, Apr 14: Disappointed with Kapil Dev's response, Pakistan's Shahid Afridi has backed his former teammate Shoaib Akhtar's proposal for an ODI series against India to help raise funds for the less privileged in their fight against the COVID-19 pandemic.

Afridi told reporters in Kohat that he was surprised by the comments of Indian great Kapil and former IPL chairman, Rajeev Shukla, who outrightly dismissed Akhtar's suggestion.

"The entire world is fighting against coronavirus and we need unity in our region to defeat this common enemy. Such negative comments don't help at all," Afridi said.

"I don't see anything wrong with Shoaib Akhtar's suggestion for Pakistan and India to play cricket.

"Kapil's reaction has surprised me. I expected better from him and feel one should not talk like this in these crisis times."

Afridi said that he was also surprised at some of the "negative comments" Indian stars Harbhajan Singh and Yuvraj Singh's support for his charity foundation attracted.

"Sport is supposed to bring people together and build bridges. It is pretty disappointing."

Afridi also urged Prime Minister Imran Khan to order the Pakistan Cricket Board (PCB) to restore departmental cricket in the country to save the livelihood of hundreds of domestic players.

"I myself played for the departments and witnessed how departments really salvaged domestic cricket in Pakistan and helped it thrive decade after decade.

"Departments take good care of the players and spend lots of money on the development of domestic cricket, so how can departmental cricket hurt Pakistan cricket," questioned Afridi.

He also questioned the PCB and the Pakistan team management for making a fitness of players a big issue.

"They are always talking about hard training and fitness tests. I have never seen fitness tests taken with such frequency and the result is that many players are getting injured and many of them are also unhappy with the situation."

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News Network
May 4,2020

May 4: Yuzvendra Chahal is among the best leg-spinners in international cricket right now but he can be more effective with better use of the crease, says former Pakistan spinner Mushtaq Ahmed.

Ahmed picked Chahal, Australia's Adam Zampa and Pakistan's Shadab Khan among the top leg-spinners in white-ball cricket.

"Chahal as been impressive. He is definitely among the top leg-spinners of the world. And I feel he would be more effective if he uses the crease a lot more," Ahmed said.

Ahmed, who has coached all around the world and is currently a consultant for his native team, said India's ability to take wickets in the middle-overs in the limited overs format through Chahal and Kuldeep Yadav has been a game-changer for them.

Both the wrist-spinners were brought into India's limited overs set-up following the 2017 Champions Trophy. Though, of late, both Chahal and Kuldeep havn't been playing together.

"He (Chahal) can go wide of the crease at times. You got to be smart enough to understand pitches. If it is a flat pitch, you can bowl stump to stump," said Ahmed, one of the best leg-spinners Pakistan has produced.

"If the ball is gripping, you can go wide of the crease because you can trouble even the best of batsmen with that angle. That way your googly also doesn't turn as much as the batsman expects and you end up taking a wicket."

Chahal has taken 91 wickets in 52 ODIs at 25.83 and 55 wickets in 42 T20s at 24.34. He is not a huge turner of the ball but uses his variations very effectively.

Ahmed also feels the likes of Chahal and Kuldeep have benefitted immensely from former captain M S Dhoni's advice from behind the stumps.

"You have got to be one step ahead of the batsman. You should know your field position as per the batsman's strength. I always say attack with fielders not with the ball. If you understand that theory, you will always be successful," the 49-year-old, who played 52 Tests and 144 ODIs, said.

"India has become a force to reckon with in all three formats as it uses its bowlers really well. Dhoni was a master at getting the best out of his bowlers in limited overs cricket and now you have Virat Kohli."

He also said the art of leg-spin remains relevant more than ever.

"You need leg-spinners and mystery spinners in your team as they have the ability to take wickets at any stage of the game. I see a lot of them coming through in the next 10-15 years.

"Most batsmen now like playing express pace but with a good leg-spinner in the team, you are always in the game," added member of the 1992 World Cup-winning squad.

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