It never looked like a run-fest, did it? Chennai’s strip kept everyone guessing, cutters gripping one minute, skidding the next, and 181 always felt a touch above par. Ishan Kishan thought so too.
“When I was wicketkeeping, I just felt like this wicket is not easy,” he admitted afterwards. “I still felt chasing this total is going to be a bit too much because wicket was not at all easy, especially when spinners were bowling and those slow balls were coming out very well. But at the same time as a No. 3 batter, I just hope my job is to just try and finish the game because, batters coming in, especially at the back-end, it’s difficult for them to take singles and at the same time score boundaries, so I had to just play till the last over.”
So that was the plan: stay in, take it deep, ignore the rising asking-rate. And credit to him, he very nearly saw it through – 70 from 47, strike-rate 148.93, and only six required when he finally holed out. Not as explosive as many of his knocks this season (he’s been rattling along at 179), yet the situation demanded something less flashy, more stubborn. Ambati Rayudu, on TV duty, called him “a massive asset for any team he plays”. Hard to argue.
Kishan actually set things up early, three fours in Spencer Johnson’s first over loosening CSK’s grip. From there he knocked it around, waited for errors, and let Heinrich Klaasen play the enforcer. The South African needed a couple of sighters, then flicked a mental switch.
“Yeah, the first couple of balls I blocked and I said, ‘no, I can’t play cricket like this,’” Klaasen said later. “I need to be aggressive on this wicket, and it went my way tonight. So yeah, I’m happy with the way I’m striking the ball. Hopefully it continues for the rest of the competition.”
That intent showed against spin. Akeal Hosein disappeared over the leg side; Noor Ahmad was dab-swept behind square; the run-rate, briefly nudging eleven, slid back under ten. Even so, there was a wobble when Abdul Samad chipped to mid-off and the visitors still needed 23 from 14. Kishan’s response? A sliced four then a flat-batted six off Mukesh Choudhary, effectively settling it.
“It was just about being there, believing in yourself,” he explained. “Sometimes the situation is difficult, but we all know how these games are won because you need to believe in yourself. You cannot doubt yourself at any point in time.”
For those interested in the pitch – a popular topic whenever Chennai hosts night matches – Klaasen summed it up neatly: “[Pitch] stayed low, when we bowled the cutters looked a lot slower and kept quite low, and when they bowled, it skidded on quite nicely, but it was a little bit up and down. It’s one of the better Chennai wickets that I’ve played, but yeah, it’s not an easy place to come play cricket.”
From CSK’s angle, 180 ought to have been defendable. Their own innings stalled precisely because Sunrisers’ quicks rolled out 39 slower-balls in 17 overs, and the surface rewarded that tactic. Yet their seamers couldn’t nail those lengths with the same regularity – too many hit the shiny side, not the grip side, and skated on for singles or worse. The spinners did create half-chances but lacked that extra yard of bite.
Still, there were small positives: Ruturaj Gaikwad’s timing looked back, and Shivam Dube found the sight-screens twice. With just a little more support they might have pushed beyond 200, which, on this uneven track, would have felt decisive.
Sunrisers, meanwhile, will talk up the control from Pat Cummins and Thangarasu Natarajan earlier in the evening, plus, of course, the calming presence of Kishan at three. Mitchell McClenaghan labelled the left-hander “ice-cool”, though Kishan himself laughed that off. “I was panicking inside,” he joked in the dressing-room corridor, “but I had to show calmness outside.”
The table is tight; one win swings you up, one defeat drags you back. For now, the orange shirts move north, CSK hover mid-pack. It could all flip again in 48 hours – such is the IPL’s revolving-door rhythm – yet this felt a properly earned away win, achieved with brains first, then muscle.
And a reminder, if anyone needed it: anchoring isn’t unfashionable when conditions insist.
