On the second ball of his spell against the Kolkata Knight Riders, the Rajasthan Royals leg-spinner Yuzvendra Chahal created history as he became the all-time leading wicket-taker of the IPL, surpassing the great CSK pace Dwayne Bravo.
It was typical of Yuzvendra Chahal to break the dangerous-looking partnership between Nitish Rana and Venkatesh Iyer by dismissing the KKR captain, caught well by Shimron Hetmyer at deep square leg. The leg-spinner was pumped up with this wicket, realising that he’s scripted history today at the Eden Gardens.
ICYMI!
That landmark moment when @yuzi_chahal became the leading IPL wicket-taker of all-time.#TATAIPL pic.twitter.com/IhkMNdB6ud
— IndianPremierLeague (@IPL) May 11, 2023
Chahal further went on to take 3 more wickets and finish with a 4-wicket haul that restricted KKR to 149.
Before the match, Chahal had equalled Bravo’s tally of 183 Indian Premier League wickets and today went past it. Chahal has taken 187 wickets in 143 Indian Premier League matches, while Bravo had scalped his 183 wickets in 161 matches. Behind them are the pair of veteran Indian leg-spinners, Piyush Chawla, with 174 wickets in 176 matches, and Amit Mishra, who has snapped 172 wickets in 160 matches. Senior RR off-spinner R Ashwin is just behind them with 171 wickets in 196 matches.
Highest wicket-takers in the IPL:
187 – Yuzvendra Chahal
183 – Dwayne Bravo
174 – Piyush Chawla
172 – Amit Mishra
171 – Ravichandran Ashwin
Speaking of his bowling performance vs KKR today, Yuzvendra Chahal said: “On this ground, I didn’t want to give easy boundaries. Wanted to keep the ball away from the batters. The pitch was slow and aiding me. (On becoming leading IPL wicket taker) I never thought when I came into the IPL with MI that I’ll get here. I’m here because of all the support I’ve got along the way with family and friends. Definitely grateful to all. I hope we can win today, the batters should be able to get the runs.”
Earlier, RR skipper Sanju Samson had won the toss and elected to field first at the Eden Gardens. RR brought back Boult in the line-up and also came in KM Asif while KKR replaced Arora with Anukul.
Nitish Rana said – I think we’re getting the type of pitches we want. We will have to play good cricket, take one game at a time and earn 2 points. One change for us – Anukul Roy replaces Vaibhav Arora. Looks like the pitch is dry, they haven’t watered a lot, so we are playing that extra spinner and add some depth to the batting
Sanju Samson said – We will bowl here first. Long tournament, need to change according to the strength and weaknesses. Couple of changes for us – Boult replaces Kuldip Yadav, KM Asif replaces Murugan Ashwin. Root will bat at 4. It’s a long tournament, we have had some tough games for the bowlers, the morale of the team is high, not easy to forget close losses, but we need to move on
Teams:
Kolkata Knight Riders (Playing XI): Rahmanullah Gurbaz(w), Jason Roy, Venkatesh Iyer, Nitish Rana(c), Andre Russell, Rinku Singh, Sunil Narine, Shardul Thakur, Anukul Roy, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy
Rajasthan Royals (Playing XI): Yashasvi Jaiswal, Jos Buttler, Sanju Samson(w/c), Joe Root, Dhruv Jurel, Shimron Hetmyer, Ravichandran Ashwin, Trent Boult, Sandeep Sharma, KM Asif, Yuzvendra Chahal
KKR impact subs: Suyash Sharma, Vaibhav Arora, N Jagadeesan, Umesh Yadav, Lockie Ferguson
RR impact subs: Donavon Ferreira, Devdutt Padikkal, Riyan Parag, Murugan Ashwin, Navdeep Saini
