Kolkata Knight Riders skipper Shreyas Iyer admitted that his team was completely outplayed in both bowling and batting during Saturday’s 75-run defeat at the hands of Lucknow Super Giants in Match 53 of the IPL 2022 at the Maharashtra Cricket Association (MCA) Stadium.
With bat and ball, the Lucknow Super Giants delivered a clinical performance. After being asked to bat first, Quinton de Kock (50 off 29 balls) and Deepak Hooda (41 off 27 balls) guided Lucknow Super Giants to 176-7 in 20 overs. Apart from them, Krunal Pandya (25 off 27) and Marcus Stoinis (28 off 14) also contributed significantly with the bat for LSG.
Andre Russell responded with an attacking knock (45 off 19), but he was not supported by the other KKR batters. Sunil Narine (22 off 12) was KKR’s second-highest scorer after Russell. In the end, Kolkata was bowled out for 101-10 in 14.3 overs, losing by 75 runs.
With the ball, Avesh Khan (3/19) and Jason Holder (3/31) were the standout performers for LSG. Ravi Bishnoi (1/31), Dushmantha Chameera (1/14), and Mohsin Khan (1/6) each took one wicket.
Shreyas Iyer stated that they made a mistake by allowing LSG to reach 176 points.
“They outplayed us in bowling and batting. They bowled well in the powerplay, they started well with the bat too. We came back in the middle but they took it away from us at the death. It was hard to read the wicket, so we chose to bowl. We found out the ball was stopping and the pitch was two-paced. It was a 155-160 wicket, but they went over that,” Iyer said at the post-match presentation on Saturday.
LSG won the match primarily due to their strong batting in the powerplay and bowling in the death overs. And Iyer stated that those are the areas where his team needs to improve in the remaining games.
“But we have not gotten the basics right. Powerplay and death are the areas to improve, hopefully, we can get it right next time,” Iyer said.