KKR’s decision to field the India U-19 starlets, Shubman Gill and Shivam Mavi, was praiseworthy. With Bhuvneshwar Kumar back for Hyderabad, the decision to drop Sunil Narine down the order wasn’t off the mark. But pushing back Gill to No.7 bordered on the inexplicable. The youngster is a conventional No.3. Sending him at the back end of the innings after Andre Russell was a huge blunder. Gill scored three off nine deliveries before Kumar put him out of his misery with a knuckle ball.
Interesting stats on last match-
4 Number of Indian pacers to take 150 wickets in the Twenty20 cricket. Bhuvneshwar Kumar joined R Vinay Kumar, Irfan Pathan and Ashish Nehra with the wicket of Dinesh Karthik.
6 Number of players with all-round double of 4,000 runs and 200 wickets in Twenty20 cricket. Shakib Al Hasan, on 8, completed his 4,000 runs in the shortest format and joined the ranks with Kieron Pollard, Shane Watson, Dwayne Bravo, Azhar Mahmood and Albie Morkel. Shakib is now actually sitting on 299 wickets. Only one player – Dwayne Bravo – has completed the all-round double of 4,000 runs and 300 wickets in Twenty20 cricket.
3 Number of consecutive wins for Sunrisers Hyderabad – their best sequence at the start of a season. They had won first two matches in 2013 and 2017 seasons.
0 Number of times Sunrisers Hyderabad had beaten Kolkata Knight Riders at Eden Gardens before this match. They had lost on all five previous occasions.