At Wankhede, Virender
Sehwag and Manan Vohra gave their team a great start. Chennai’s bowling was listless……. Chasing CSK
lost Faf du Plessis (0) in the first over itself, off the bowling of Mitchell
Johnson ~ and then strode in Raina at No.3. The southpaw quickly got his eye in
and struck a flurry of sixes and fours to neutralise the early loss. Dhoni
blamed the seniors for not putting up the required effort !
The finals was a real
big match …. Who would have expected Piyush Chawla to heave a big six off
Johnson ? earlier Wriddhiman Saha scored
a ton setting up a target of 200. The chase
was really on throughout – wickets fell – but required run rate was always
under control. It was Manish Pandey who
stole the show. Pandey's 94 off 50
balls, an innings fueled by an urgency that did not abate, pulled off the
highest successful chase in any Twenty20 final. Towards,
the end Pandey left and so did Suryakumar Yadav …. 11 off 7 is not all the
difficult … but it was Mitchell Johnson firing in Yorkers ……. Off the last delivery, Johnson bounced –
Chawla was ready for the challenge – swivelled, connected it too well over deep
backward square for a six … Sunil Narine was striving to get out … Chawla
got another chance and finished with a flourish to the boundary.
Earlier, when Punjab
were playing, in the 16th over, Narine dropped a skier from Wriddhiman Saha off
his own bowling and conceded a single. The next ball, Uthappa did a smart (!) job – replays clearly
showed that bastman was well out of the
creas ~ but was a not out …. Uthappa's gloves had been a fraction in front of
the stumps as he collected the ball. A no-ball was called, Vohra was reprieved,
and he drilled the next delivery down the ground for four.
In the IPL melee, one
can be forgotten, for not following other sports… the 2014 Men's Hockey World
Cup, the 13th edition of the Hockey World Cup is onat the Kyocera Stadion in
The Hague, Netherlands. India is closetted
with Australia, England, Belgium, Spain,
Malaysia in Pool A while Germany, Netherlands, New Zealand, South Korea,
Argentina, and South Africa are in the other half.
Today, a late goal
gave England a win over India 2-1. At Rolland
garros, defending champion Rafa Nadal dismantled unseeded Serbian Dusan Lajovic
6-1 6-2 6-1 to set up a quarter-final clash with fellow Spaniard David Ferrer
in a repeat of last year's final. Eight-times champion and world No.1 Nadal
improved his Roland Garros win-loss record to a remarkable 63-1 to advance
having not dropped a set in Paris this year.
With regards – S.
Sampathkumar
2nd June
2014.
Photo credit : BCCI
