Synopsis: Priyansh Arya crafted a skilful 35-ball 69 and Prabhsimran Singh mixed his aggressive heaves with deft late-cuts to make a dazzling 49-ball 83 to propel Punjab Kings to 201. But rain had the last laugh in Kolkata.
Plucky Prabhsimran dazzles
Prabhsimran can give the impression of being a biff-er who likes to carve and wallop. He does all that with aplomb, but it’s his crafty little deflections – the late cuts and laps – that say so much about his batting brain. He has an uncanny ability to mix both sides, and that puts opponents off their game.
On a sluggish Eden Gardens pitch where the ball was stopping, KKR captain Ajinkya Rahane had understandably dispensed with deep third man, placing a short third and backward point instead. There wasn’t much pace to work on, and allied with the pitch’s nature, it made sense. But Prabhsimran isn’t easy to tie down.
In the first ball of the 5th over, Harshit Rana was chopped over that short third with panache. Couple of deliveries later, he shuffled to the offside to lap a length ball over fine-leg. But at least both those deliveries had some pace on them. The two successive fours off the left-armer Chetan Sakariya in the 13th over were peachy. The balls seemed to stop on him a bit, but he kept waiting, opening the bat-face to guide it between short third and backward point – shots that would have made that Sri Lankan master Arjuna Ranatunga proud. It’s one thing if Prabhsimran was only capable of deftness or if he was in that mode of batting phase, but this came bang in the middle of a few typical whacks and hacks that he plays. The ability to mix art with violence in a frenetic T20 game can’t be easy, but on his day, the Punjab batsman has often shown exactly that skill.. as he showed next ball in the same over, whacking a pull off Sakariya over midwicket boundary.
For a few overs when the spinners were introduced – from the 6th to 9th – he did stumble a touch as both Varun Chakaravarthy and Sunil Narine were not only making the ball stop but also turn. He bunted, stabbed, but realised that this was a phase to see through, and not lose his wicket. And when the release shot came in the last ball of the 11th over, when he reached out to drag-swipe a full well-outside-off ball from Narine over long-off, there was such a delightful joy in his face and in the way he punched the gloves of his partner Arya. The next over was that Sakariya over of late cuts.
Prabhsimran does the good-old heaves rather well, and Varun was slugged for a four and a six in the 14th over. Varun switched to round the stumps, but Prabhsimran too switched to pull out a fierce reverse-wallop to the backward point boundary. He fell, hitting a full toss from Vaibhav to long-off, and trudged off in disappointment.
Impressive Arya
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Arya collected raves from Ricky Ponting and applause from the crowd in yet another skilful knock. He does give the impression that his off-side play is way better than the leg-side, but there is an increasing maturity in the way he constructs his innings that’s impressive. He had closeted himself in the Ratnami jungle near Bhopal couple of months ahead of IPL at a residential academy run by his coach, Sanjay Bharadwaj. He had 12-hour practice days that began at 6.30am and he wasn’t allowed to use his phone for more than an hour. He spent much of the time perfecting his cut and pull shots against express pace, delivered by throwdowns with sidearms. He didn’t have to use either shot much on Saturday night, though, on a slow track.
He drove the KKR seamers Vaibhav and Sakariya to distraction, collecting 6 boundaries off them in the powerplay, and smashed Harshit Rana for three boundaries in an over, but that wasn’t a surprise; the bowling was tripe. But his batting against spin impressed. Even as Prabhsimran was trying to come to terms with the slowness and turn, Arya glided along neatly. First, by pushing for singles and once he became comfortable, he slog swept Varun and charged out at Narine for sixes that eased the pressure on his partner. Rana was made to look clueless as his attempts to bowl full, well outside off stump were nullified by Priyansh’s skill to slice up and over. He fell, trying to hit a six off Andre Russell, but by then he had set the base for Prabhsmiran to flow, and later Shreyas Iyer to apply the finishing touches.
Brief scores: Punjab Kings: 201/4 (Prabhsimran Singh 83, Priyansh Arya 69, Vaibhav Arora 2/34) vs Kolkata Knight Riders 7/0 after 1 over. Match abandoned.