Gayle half-century not enough to stop Mumbai
MUMBAI, India (CMC) — West Indies captain Chris Gayle stroked a measured half century for the Kolkata Knight Riders in his Indian Premier League season debut but was upstaged by batting prodigy Sachin Tendulkar as Mumbai Indians pulled off a pulsating seven-wicket win yesterday.
The left-handed Gayle, who was kept out of Kolkata’s game on Saturday with a fever, stroked 75 from 60 balls with four fours and two sixes as they rattled up 155 for three from their allotted 20 overs after choosing to bat first at the Brabourne Stadium.
Tendulkar then unleashed a superb, unbeaten 71 from 48 balls with 10 fours to propel Mumbai to their target with nine balls to spare, to uncork their third win in four outings.
Gayle seemed set for something special when he orchestrated two vital partnerships for Kolkata. He added 70 for the first wicket with Sourav Ganguly (31) and another 82 with Owais Shah (31) but both partnerships were slow and the late explosion never really came.
Gayle’s West Indies counterpart all-rounder Dwayne Bravo was ineffective and his four overs cost 36 runs.
Tendulkar then took charge, posting a hasty 61 from 41 balls for the first wicket with Shikhar Dhawan who scored 23 from 21 balls and then adding a further 56 from 43 balls for the second wicket with Saurabh Tiwary (30) to put Mumbai in sight of victory.
Big-hitting West Indies batsman Kieron Pollard failed to fire, however, scoring seven from as many balls before falling lbw to pacer Ishant Sharma in the 16th over with 27 runs left for victory.
There were to be no last ditch heroics from Kolkata as Rajagopal Sathish belted an 11-ball 21 to win easily.
Gayle went wicket-less in four overs which cost 31 runs while Sharma was the leading bowler with two for 44.