Chennai Super Kings set up a Royals date

Mumbai: Chennai Super Kings' pace attack ripped apart the strong Kings XI Punjab top-order batting and restricted them to a paltry 112-8 in the second semi-final of Indian Premier League at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai on Saturday night.


Everything went wrong for Kings XI Punjab after skipper Yuvraj Singh opted to bat first on winning the toss and half their side was back in the dug-out with only 40 on the board on a seaming track.


Poor batting coupled with some good seam bowling undid the Punjab side.


Makhaya Ntini and Manpreet Singh Gony rocked the high-flying Kings XI Punjab side with a double strike each which reduced Yuvraj Singh-led team to a pathetic 34-4 in the sixth over.


Ntini started the domination of the ball over the bat when he had James Hopes caught behind chasing an outswinger for two in the second over.

Then Gony dismissed Kumar Sangakkara in similar fashion, caught by wicket keeper Parthiv Patel to leave Punjab at a shaky 2 for 11.


Things became grimmer when Yuvraj pulled Gony, who bowled an excellent four-over spell for figures of 2 for 14, straight to Muttiah Muralitharan at wide mid-on to leave them gasping at 28-3.


But the biggest blow was when South African pacer Ntini dismissed Punjab batting mainstay Marsh in his third over.


The left-handed opener from Western Australia attempted to pull a ball from wide of his stumps but only managed to get an under-edge that crashed on to the stumps to the absolute delight of the Chennai Super Kings players.


Down in the dumps, Punjab lost Irfan Pathan in a horrible mix-up with Mahela Jayawardene who refused to respond to the former's call for a third run. The long throw from Ntini, who dived to stop a boundary, came handy for running out Irfan when he was stranded at mid-pitch.


Punjab, tottering at 40-5 at Pathan's dismissal, lost their sixth wicket when Jayawardene, with his poise upset at Pathan's run-out and open show of anger while walking back, tried to glide Albie Morkel and top-edged to Patel who grabbed his third catch.


At 45-6 there was a possibility of Punjab doing worse than what Kolkata Knight Riders had done (67 all out; the lowest score of IPL) against Mumbai Indians at the same venue on May 16.


This was averted with Wilkin Mota (25 off 26 balls) and Ramesh Powar (28 off 22 balls; 1X6; 4X4) leading the way by adding 35 runs for the eighth wicket.


The duo took advantage of some below-par performance by the Chennai team in the field to take the score close to 100 before Mota was out.


Powar helped boost the tally by creaming Balaji for three fours in the last over from which 14 runs were scored.

Ntini got 2 for 23 in his four overs bowled on the trot, Morkel ended up with 2 for 27 while Muralitharan, who bowled the first over, finished with 1 for 19.

Teams:

Chennai Super Kings: Mahendra Singh Dhoni (captain), Parthiv Patel, Sivaramakrishnan Vidyut, Suresh Raina, Albie Morkel, S Badrinath, C Kapugedera, L Balaji, Manpreet Gony, Muthiah Muralitharan, Makhaya Ntini.


Kings XI Punjab: Yuvraj Singh (captain), Shaun Marsh, James Hopes, Mahela Jayawardene, Kumar Sangakkara, Piyush Chawla, Wilkin Mota, Irfan Pathan, Romesh Powar, VRV Singh, S Sreesanth.