Angkrish Raghuvanshi and captain Ajinkya Rahane scored the bulk of the runs to help Kolkata Knight Riders beat the Sunrisers Hyderabad by seven-wickets in their Tata IPL match at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium in Hyderabad on Sunday but it was the KKR bowlers who set up victory.
The high-flying and in-form Sunrisers were restricted to a distinctly modest 165 all out and KKR, desperate to ignite their stuttering season, were in no mood to take chances with Rahane’s 43 coming from 36 balls while Raghuvanshi was similarly cautious with 59 from 47 deliveries.
The stand that all but took us over the line 🤜🤛 pic.twitter.com/6DP8yhgjUu
— KolkataKnightRiders (@KKRiders) May 3, 2026
Both were dismissed within sight of the finish line but Rinku Singh (22* from 11) and Cameron Green (3*) made certain of the two points with 10 balls to spare. Any chance of early pressure in the run chase was removed by New Zealander Finn Allen who blasted 29 from only 13 balls with three fours and two sixes.
The Sunrisers’ ‘all-or-nothing’ approach with the bat is bound to implode from time-to-time and this was one if those times. Having reached a daunting 105-1 after nine overs the innings collapsed in a heap to 165 all out in 19 overs with spinners Varun Chakravarthy (3-36) and Sunil Narine (2-31) sharing five wickets.
Travis Head gave the home side their customary flying start reaching 71-1 in the Power Play after the early loss of Abhishek Sharma (15) and another 200+ total beckoned. But both men holed out in the deep, Head to deep midwicket for 61 from just 28 balls (9x4, 3x6) and Kishan to long off for 42 from 29 balls.
Heinrich Klaasen (11) fell to an astonishing catch by Rovman Powell, a one-handed diving effort at deep midwicket from a pull shot against Cameron Green (3-0-34-1) while the remainder of the batting line-up conjured up a variety of top edges from power shots.
Sunrisers remain in third place with 12 points from 10 games, level with RCB who have played nine games and a point behind leaders Punjab Kings who have 13 points and two games in hand.
KKR also remain unchanged in eighth place moving from five points to seven from their nine matches, just one point behind Delhi Capitals and Chennai Super Kings in seventh and sixth place respectively.
SUNRISERS HYDERABAD: Abhishek Sharma, Travis Head, Ishan Kishan, Heinrich Klaasen, Salil Arora (wkt), Aniket Verma, Smaran Ravichandran, Pat Cummins (captain), Shivang Kumar, Harshal Patel, Eshan Malinga
Impact subs: Praful Hinge, Harsh Dubey, Liam Livingstone, Sakib Hussain, Zeeshan Ansari
KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS: Ajinkya Rahane (captain), Angkrish Raghuvanshi (wkt), Cameron Green, Rovman Powell, Manish Pandey, Rinku Singh, Anukul Roy, Sunil Narine, Vaibhav Arora, Kartik Tyagi, Varun Chakaravarthy