Photo: SPORTZPICS

Sam Curran’s brilliant effort with the bat proved to be in vain, as opener Chris Lynn’s onslaught in the powerplay followed by Shubman Gill’s classy knock helped Kolkata Knight Riders upstage Kings XI Punjab by seven wickets at the IS Bindra Stadium in Mohali on Friday.

Having been put in to bat, the Shers got off to a bad start as in-form KL Rahul perished to a slower delivery from Sandeep Warrier in just the third over of the match. The seamer then got rid of Chris Gayle on the first ball of his very next over as KXIP lost both their openers with just 22 on the board.

Nicholas Pooran and Mayank Agarwal though batted the Shers out of trouble with a brilliant 69-run partnership, with the former playing the role of the aggressor, smashing 48 in just 27 deliveries before getting caught deep on the boundary with the scoreboard reading 91/3.

A couple of overs later, Agarwal, too, had to walk back after a brilliant throw from the deep caught him short of the crease in his attempt of completing a double. New man Sam Curran and Mandeep Singh scored 34 off the next 20 deliveries to set up a grandstand finish for the Shers.

But the latter’s dismissal, quickly followed by captain Ravichandran Ashwin returning to the pavilion, pegged the Shers back in their batting effort. However, the returning Curran smashed 31 runs in the final 10 balls of the innings to help KXIP finish with a strong total of 183/6.

In reply, the visitors were off to the perfect start as opener Lynn struck three straight boundaries off Arshdeep Singh’s bowling and followed it up with a six and a four in captain Ashwin’s over to keep the run rate close to 10 in the opening five overs.

Lynn picked up 10 more off Andrew Tye’s bowling but a short ball from the Australian speedster got the better of his compatriot as the batsman had to walk back after scoring 46.

Following the dismissal of his opening partner, Shubman Gill picked up where Lynn left off and continued the onslaught, picking up 36 run in the next four overs to put the visitors in command of the chase. The skipper managed to get a breakthrough by getting rid of Robin Uthappa, but in came the dangerous Andre Russell and along with Gill forged a 50-run partnership in just 26 deliveries, bringing the required rate down to almost a-run-a-ball.

Despite Russell’s dismissal soon after, captain Dinesh Karthik and Gill batted sensibly to chase remaining runs down and see their team over the line with two overs to spare.