More than a decade after winning their maiden IPL crown in Chennai in 2012, the MA Chidambaram Stadium in the southern city once again turned out a happy hunting ground for the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) as they dished out a spectacular performance to decimate Sunrisers Hyderabad by 8 wickets in the most one-sided IPL final for their third title on Sunday.

The only thing that went the Sunrisers’ way on the day was the toss, when Pat Cummins elected to bat, and never found themselves in control of the proceedings, thanks to the disciplined KKR bowling attack.

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Mitchell Starc led the rout of the second-best team of the tournament, picking two of the three wickets that SRH lost in the powerplay. They went on to lose their fourth wicket in the 10th over while Andre Russell then got the big wicket of Aiden Markram in the 11th to leave the Hyderabad side struggling for some solidity.

Sunrisers’ explosive style of batting seems to have backfired on them on the biggest occasion of them all as they eventually succumbed to 113 — the lowest total in an IPL final whether batting first or second.

Starc once again showed his big-match temperament by starting with arguably the ball of the tournament, even as the rest of the KKR pace bowling unit, comprising Vaibhav Arora, Harshit Rana, Andre Russell was too good for Sunrisers Hyderabad on a pitch that offered seam movement for at least seven overs followed by grip off the surface too.

In contrast, KKR’s chase looked like one long celebration as Venkatesh Iyer and Rahmanullah Gurbaz first deflated SRH and then cruised through to their third title. Iyer, who joined Gurbaz at the fall of opener Sunil Narine in the second over, came up with a belligerent 52 off 26 balls to set the tone of the chase along with Gurbaz’s handy 32-ball 36-run cameo. Shreyas Iyer, the captain who has had a tough year, losing his place in the Indian side and his annual retainer, saw the side romp home with 57 balls to spare.

The KKR players waited at the dugout, they celebrated when the scores were levelled with a single off the previous ball and once the formality was completed on the third ball of the 11th over, the entire dugout stormed onto the pitch and engulfed the two Iyers.

From KKR’s perspective, the one common factor across all their title wins has been Gautam Gambhir, under whose captaincy the KKR won their first two titles in 2012 and 2014, and on his return as a mentor ahead of the 2024 IPL season, the former India opener infused the passion and hunger in the setup that has been missing over the past few seasons.

Gambhir’s presence in the dressing room changed the atmosphere in the purple outfit as he didn’t hesitate to take risky calls like promoting Narine to open the innings, and encouraged flexibility in the batting line-up that could adapt to any situations as KKR lost just three matches en-route to the 2024 IPL final.