Kolkata (West Bengal) [India], March 24 (ANI): Following a win against SunRisers Hyderabad (SRH) in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024, Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) right-arm seamer Harshit Rana asserted that his parents watched him live for the first time.
An explosive half-century by Andre Russell helped the KKR edge past SRH by 4 runs in their IPL 2024 match on Saturday at Eden Gardens. Heinrich Klaasen’s 29-ball 63 went in vain, as he took SRH close to victory but could not take them beyond the finish line.
Rana picked up three wickets in his four-over spell and gifted only 33 runs. The KKR bowler displayed a stunning performance in the final over of the second inning and helped the Kolkata-based franchise clinch a win.
The young bowler stated that he was playing the first match and wanted his parents to see that.
“This was the first time that my parents came to watch my match. Earlier, I used to think that when they watched my match, I would not perform well. This season, I was playing the first match, and I wanted to show them the match,” Rana said in a video posted by IPL.
The 22-year-old further said that his heartbeats were very fast as the fans had a lot of expectations from him as he was bowling the last over of the match where he has to defend 13 runs.
“My heartbeats must have been very fast because of all the expectations of the fans and there weren’t a lot of runs to defend. I thought to myself that the worst that could happen was the match ending in that ball. However, if I could execute my plans, the match would go deep.”
Harshit Rana was the pick of the KKR bowlers in the high-scoring thriller, conceding just 33 runs from his full quota of four overs and picking up three important wickets,” the right-arm seamer added.
Recapping the match, put to bat first by SRH, KKR was reduced to 51/4 in 7.3 overs. However, a half-century by Phil Salt (54 in 40 balls, with three fours and three sixes) and an explosive knock by Ramandeep Singh (35 in 17 balls, with four and four sixes) kept the team’s run rate just fine, but still, they were struggling at 119/6 in 13.5 overs.
An explosive 67-run partnership followed between Andre Rusell (64* in 25 balls, with three fours and seven sixes) and Rinku Singh (23 in 15 balls, with three fours), powering KKR to 208/7 in 20 overs.
In the chase of 209 runs, SRH started well with a 60-run opening stand between Mayank Agarwal (32 in 21 balls with four boundaries and a six) and Abhishek Sharma (32 in 19 balls, with four boundaries and two sixes). The team lost their way and was soon 145/5 in 16.5 overs.
However, Heinrich Klaasen (63 in 29 balls with eight sixes) and Shahbaz Ahmed (16 in five balls, with a four and two sixes) unreleased a barrage of sixes towards the end. 13 runs were needed in the final over, but Harshit Rana (3/33) held his nerves, taking two wickets and defending the remaining runs. (ANI)
