KKR had no right to win vs MI after they were five down: Shane Watson
Former Australia all-rounder Shane Watson said that KKR had no right to win their fixture against MI in Match 51 of the Indian Premier League 2024.
In Short
- KKR defeated MI by 24 runs after 12 years at Wankhede
- Shane Watson says it will massively boost their confidence
- KKR continue to be on the second spot on points table
Former Australia all-rounder Shane Watson is in awe of KKR after their ‘come from behind’ victory against MI during Match 51 of Indian Premier League 2024 (IPL 2024) on Friday, May 3 at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai. The victory ended Kolkata’s 12-year-long streak of not winning a game at Wankhede with the last victory coming way back in 2012.
The Knight Riders came into the game with no qualms about their dismal record and managed to defend a score of 169 on the high-scoring surface at MI’s home ground. Following the 24-run victory by the Shreyas Iyer-led side Watson was full of praise for KKR and praised the side for their fighting spirit and said that they managed to win even when they didn’t deserve to.
“KKR had no right to win that game tonight after the position they were in five wickets down. It just shows the fight that they have and also just some of the things that happened. Some of the decisions that were made whether that was bowling changes or batting lineup deployment, some of those decisions were very baffling just to really give KKR the upper hand in a game that was just on a knife’s edge at certain times,” said Watson on JioCinema.
Further speaking ahead, the two-time IPL champion said that the win would instil a lot of confidence in the side and they will believe that they don’t have to be at their best to win matches.
“Look that will give KKR so much confidence to know that they don’t have to be at their very best and be in a position where the game was nearly done and they’ve got the fight and determination to find their way to actually get on the right side of the result,” he added.
Coming back to the match, after being put in to bat first, KKR were left reeling at 57/5 after 6.1 overs with Nuwan Thushara running through their top order (3/42). However, Venkatesh Iyer (70 off 52) and Manish Pandey (42 off 31) led KKR’s fight back with their 83-run stand for the sixth wicket off 62 balls.
Courtesy of their partnership, KKR finished their innings on 169 in 19.5 overs. In reply, MI could only manage to score 145 in 18.5 overs as Mitchell Starc (4/33), Sunil Narine (2/22) and Varun Chakravarthy (2/22) ran through their batting. Only Suryakumar Yadav showed some fight for Mumbai with his innings of 56 (35), however, his dismissal in the 16th over by Andre Russell (3/30) crushed MI’s hopes of winning the game.
Following their win, KKR retained their second spot on the points table with 14 points from ten games while MI continued to be reeling at ninth spot with six points from 11 matches.