With their bowling attack firing in unison, Lucknow Super Giants defeated Punjab Kings by 20 runs in their Indian Premier League 2022 clash at the Maharashtra Cricket Association Stadium in Pune on Friday.
Krunal Pandya was excellent in the middle overs and put the choke on Punjab with a high class spell of 2/11 from his four overs. Dushmantha Chameera was impressive as well and picked 2/17, while left-arm pacer Mohsin Khan returned with figures of 3/24.
Asked to bat first, Lucknow got top order contributions from Quinton de Kock (46 off 37) and Deepak Hooda (34 off 28) but finished with a below-par total of 153/8 after their middle order struggled.
Kagiso Rabada was the pick of the bowlers for Punjab and removed skipper KL Rahul, Pandya, Ayush Badoni and Chameera to finish with figures of 4/38 from his four overs.
In reply, captain Mayank Agarwal got out for 25 off 17 but Punjab found their way to a promising position at the end of the powerplay at 46/1.
However, Ravi Bishnoi cleaned up the experienced Shikhar Dhawan (5 off 15) in the seventh over before the dangerous Bhanuka Rajapaksa was removed by Krunal Pandya in the next over. Liam Livingstone hit Bishnoi for a couple of sixes but he too perished soon after.
Jonny Bairstow, in at No 3, held the key for Punjab but the right-hander got out in 16th over for 32 off 28 to put the contest firmly in Lucknow’s corner. Rishi Dhawan (21* off 22) started slowly before managing to hit a few boundaries but that wasn’t enough.