Kolkata Knight Riders bowler Nitish Rana celebrates the wicket of DC batter Aman Hakim Khan during the IPL 2023 cricket match between Delhi Capitals and Kolkata Knight Riders at the Arun Jaitley Stadium, in New Delhi, on April 20, 2023.
| Photo Credit: PTI
Kolkata Knight Riders suffered their third consecutive defeat in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 against Delhi Capitals on April 20, and KKR skipper Nitish Rana took the responsibility for this loss.
Nitish has displayed his potential as a batter in the past few games. He scored 75 (41) against Sunrisers Hyderabad, however, his knock was not enough to take KKR across the finish line. “I take the responsibility for this, I should have stood there,” Nitish Rana said after the match.
Against DC all eyes were stuck on him as KKR lost wickets in the crucial moment of the game. Rana failed to step up as he walked back to the pavilion for a score of 4(7) as he became the first victim of Ishant Sharma.
As KKR batters accepted their fate and ended up putting a low score of 127 in 20 overs on the board, KKR bowlers played a pivotal role in bringing the visitors back into the game. “Credit to the bowlers though, I think the upcoming games will be good for us. We were just trying to delay, but they played really well in the powerplay. That’s where they won the game. We need to play well as a team. We need to bowl like the way we did today, if we manage to sort these things out, we can fight better,” Nitish Rana added.
Even though Nitish failed to perform with the bat, he stepped up with the ball and ended up picking two wickets in four overs and gave away 17 runs. Still, his performance with the ball was not enough to clinch the victory for KKR. Chasing the lowest total of 127 in this year’s IPL, David Warner seemed in his natural style, hitting bowler from the start. However, Prithvi Shaw continued to disappoint with his bad form, he gave his wicket to Varun Chakravarthy scoring just 13 off 11 balls in the 5th over.
DC reached the 50-run mark with ease in 5.3 overs. By punishing Sunil Nairne’s 6th over conceding 17 runs, DC scored 61/1 after the powerplay. KKR’s light of hope came with the dismissal of Mitchell Marsh followed by Phil Salt in the 9th and 10 overs. Warner clinched his fourth fifty this season off 33 balls comprising ten fours.
Varun with his second wicket gave a big breakthrough to KKR by clearing set-in batter Warner at 57 off 41 balls. Anukul Roy dismissed Manish Pandey at 21 off 23 balls and Nitish Rana sent Aman Hakim Khan back to the dressing room on a duck. Due to the dismissal of batters in regular intervals, DC struggled in the mid-overs as they did not hit a single boundary after the 16th over onwards.
This brought the match to the last over finished on April 17 at Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium. In the last over, DC needed 7 runs. With the help of one no-ball, DC chased down the total in 19.2 overs with four wickets.