KOLKATA, May 20:
Lucknow Super Giants defeated Kolkata Knight Riders by one run in their final league game to qualify for the IPL play-offs here on Saturday.
Nicholas Pooran smashed a 30-ball 58 to take Lucknow Super Giants to a competitive 176 for eight after being sent in to bat.
LSG lost wickets at regular intervals to reel at 73 for five in 10.1 overs before Pooran and Ayush Badoni shared 74 runs for the sixth wicket to lay the base for the total.
But then LSG witnessed another batting collapse to be restricted before Krishnappa Gowtham played a short little unbeaten 4-ball 11-run cameo to give LSG bowlers something to defend.
For KKR, Shardul Thakur (2/27), Sunil Narine (2/28) and Vaibhav Arora (2/30) scalped two wickets apiece.
Chasing, Rinku Singh remained unbeaten on 67 off 33 balls while Jason Roy made 28-ball 45 up the order but it was not enough as KKR could manage 175 for seven.
Ravi Bishnoi (2/23) and Yash Thakur (2/31) picked up two wickets each for LSG. (PTI)
Scoreboard
Lucknow Super Giants:
Karan Sharma c Thakur b Harshit Rana 3
Quinton de Kock c Russell b Varun 28
Prerak Mankad c Harshit Rana b Arora 26
Marcus Stoinis c Iyer b Arora 0
Krunal Pandya c Singh b Narine 9
Ayush Badoni c Thakur b Narine 25
Nicholas Pooran c Iyer b Thakur 58
Krishnappa Gowtham not out 11
Ravi Bishnoi b Thakur 2
Naveen-ul-Haq not out 2
Extras: (B-4, LB-1, NB-2, W-5) 12
Total: (For 8 wickets in 20 overs) 176
Fall of wickets: 1-14, 2-55, 3-55, 4-71, 5-73, 6-147, 7-159, 8-162 Bowling:Harshit Rana 3-0-21-1, Vaibhav Arora 4-0-30-2, Varun Chakravarthy 4-0-38-1, Nitish Rana 1-0-3-0, Shardul Thakur 2-0-27-2, Sunil Narine 4-0-28-2, Suyash Sharma 1-0-12-0, Andre Russell 1-0-12-0.
Kolkata Knight Riders:
Jason Roy b Pandya 45
Venkatesh Iyer c Ravi Bishnoi b Gowtham 24
Nitish Rana c Pandya b Ravi Bishnoi 8
Rahmanullah Gurbaz c Ravi Bishnoi b Yash Thakur 10
Rinku Singh not out 67
Andre Russell b Ravi Bishnoi 7
Shardul Thakur c Mankad b Yash Thakur 3
Sunil Narine run out (Naveen-ul-Haq/de Kock) 1
Vaibhav Arora not out 1
Extras: (LB-4, W-5) 9
Total: (For 7 wickets in 20 overs) 175
Fall of wickets: 1-61, 2-78, 3-82, 4-108, 5-120, 6-134, 7-136
Bowling: Mohsin Khan 1-0-15-0, Naveen-ul-Haq 4-0-46-0, Krunal Pandya 4-0-30-1, Krishnappa Gowtham 4-0-26-1, Ravi Bishnoi 4-0-23-2, Yash Thakur 3-0-31-2.