Lucknow’s own Marcus Stoinis silences sea of yellow at Chepauk
CHENNAI: Marcus Stoinis’ splendid counter-attacking century (124 not out) came in handy for Lucknow Super Giants as they beat Chennai Super Kings by six wickets in their IPL encounter at Chepauk on Tuesday.
When 17 runs were required off the last over from Mustafizur Rahman, Stoinis struck a six and three consecutive boundaries to fashion a memorable win. Deepak Hooda also played a big hand, with a six-ball 17 as the pair combined to devastating effect. The win also helped them to leapfrog the hosts in the points table.
Earlier, a captain’s knock of 108 not out by Ruturaj Gaikwad and a brilliant half-century (66) by Shivam Dube propelled the hosts to 210. Chasing 211 for a win, Lucknow had a disastrous start. They lost their star opener Quinton de Kock in the very third ball of their innings, castled by Deepak Chahar for a blob. Stoinis joined KL Rahul and the duo were working hard to stitch a stand. They were taking risks and trying to keep the scoreboard ticking.
During one such attempt, Rahul got out. He went for an uppish drive off a fuller one from Mustafizur, that failed to clear Ruturaj at extra cover. The CSK captain pounced on to the offering. The introduction of spinners, Ravindra Jadeja and Moeen Ali, helped Stoinis play in a relaxed manner and score runs freely. He notched up his 50 almost effortlessly.
As soon as the CSK spinners completed their first spell of two overs, Ruturaj brought in Matheesha Pathirana and was rewarded. Pathirana castled Devdutt Padikkal with a quicker one as the Karnataka batter was in two minds to play the ball. But when Stoinis and Nicholas Pooran looked like coming close to the target, the latter got out, his skier off Pathirana was held by Shardul Thakur.
Coming to Gaikwad’s century, he played with lot of responsibility and purpose. He used his feet well and was judicious in his shot selection. Even as they lost a few wickets in the first phase of the innings, he did not lose his composure and played sensibly. He did not allow pressure to affect his game and went about his task in a professional manner. His glide off Mohsin Khan where the ball went to the backward point boundary and his perfect sweep off Krunal Pandya showed his class and control.
Dube put to use his height and struck three consecutive sixes off Yash Thakur to send wild celebrations in the stands. His end came when he was run out taking a quick single. Ruturaj and Dube added 104 runs in 47 balls for the fourth wicket. The CSK skipper played to the merit of the ball and also found the gaps to score runs. He scored boundaries at will be it off Henry, Mohsin and Bishnoi. Brief scores: CSK 210/4 in 20 ovs (Gaikwad 108 n.o, Dube 66, Henry 1/28) lost to LSG 213/4 in 19.3 ovs (Stoinis 124 n.o, Pooran 34).