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Cricket

‘Hum Abhi Zinda Hai’- Fans go crazy as Kolkata crush Hyderabad to keep their playoff hopes alive

Kolkata still have an outside chance of reaching the playoffs as they registered their sixth win on Saturday.

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Jennifer
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Kolkata

Kolkata: (Image Source: BCCI/IPL)

Kolkata beat Hyderabad by 54  runs to register their sixth win on Saturday at Maharashtra Cricket Association Stadium in Pune. With that win, they have 12 points to their name and Kolkata now would be looking to win the next win by a massive margin to give themselves an outside chance of reaching the playoffs.

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Kolkata batted first on Saturday and posted a competitive score of 177 runs in the first innings. Given how Kolkata played in their first half of the innings, nobody would have thought that they would have reached the 170-run mark. Men in form, Venkatesh Iyer (7 off 6) and Nitish Rana (26 off 16) failed to hit the straps.

Skipper, Shreyas Iyer’s woes with the bat also continued as he got out after scoring 15 runs in 9 balls. Kolkata had lost 5 wickets for just 94 runs in 11.3 overs and Umran Malik had picked three wickets out of them. However, Sam Billings and Andre Russell then stitched a game-changing partnership of 63 runs for the sixth wicket to lead Kolkata’s recovery.

Bhuvneshwar Kumar, eventually, broke the partnership after sending Billings back to the hut in the 19th over. He made 34 runs in 29 balls. However, it was Andre Russell, who starred with the bat, as he smashed an unbeaten knock of 49 runs in 28 balls, a knock which was studded with 3 fours and 4 sixes. He played a major role in taking the team to a winning score.

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In pursuit of the total, skipper Kane Williamson, once again, struggled to deliver with the bat. He consumed 16 deliveries for 9 runs before Andre Russell had him bowled in the 6th over. The likes of Rahul Tripathi (9 off 12) and Nicholas Pooran (2 off 3) also failed to hit the straps.

Abhishek Sharma (43 off 28) was scoring runs from the one end but wickets fell at regular intervals at the other end. At the end of 13 overs, Hyderabad had lost their four top-order batsmen for just 76 runs on the board.

Aiden Markram showed some resistance with a handy knock of 32 runs in 25 balls, however, he too couldn’t take the team home. His wicket in the 15th meant it was all but over for Hyderabad.

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In the end, they were restricted to just 123 runs in the second innings, thereby, falling 54 runs short of the target. Hyderabad now have 5 wins in 12 matches. They still have an outside chance of making into the playoffs but you don't expect that to happen.

Here's a look at some of the best reactions from the match:

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