Kolkata, May 12 (IANS). Opener Yashasvi Jaiswal scored an unbeaten 98 off 47 balls, including the fastest half-century in the history of the tournament in 13 balls, in the Season 2023 match played at the Eden Gardens here on Thursday. In this match, Rajasthan Royals defeated Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) by 9 wickets.
Jaiswal hit 13 fours and five sixes at a strike rate of 208.51. The left-handed opener brought up his half-century in 13 balls. He shared an unbroken partnership of 121 runs off 69 balls for the second wicket with Sanju Samson, ending with an unbeaten 48 off 29 balls. Rajasthan reached the line with 41 balls to spare. Rajasthan has reached number three in the points table with 12 points in the same number of matches.
Chasing the target of 150 runs, 21-year-old Jaiswal started in the best way. His opening over attack continued, he danced down the pitch and edged past mid-off and hit three fours to collect 26 runs from the over.
Although Jos Buttler was run out for a duck, Jaiswal hit a four on the overthrow and then hit Harshit Rana for a six. He hit Shardul Thakur for three consecutive fours over mid-off, deep mid-wicket and cover before taking a single to bring up his half-century in 13 balls.
Post that there was no stopping Jaiswal as he dismissed Varun Chakravarthy for four. Harshit then gets ready to go and cut the boundaries. There was no respite in store for Kolkata, as Samson removed Chakraborty for six and four respectively.
Jaiswal pulled off the shot of the innings in the seventh over by backing off Sunil Narine’s delivery inside-out to the extra cover boundary, then pulled Suyash Sharma for another maximum.
The right-handed batsman then hit a four off Suyyash and three sixes off Anukul Roy.
While Samson lofts Chakraborty’s ball for a six. Jaiswal hit two boundaries with a reverse sweep and followed it up with another sweep off Thakur for a boundary, scoring an unbeaten 98.
Brief scores: Kolkata Knight Riders 149/7 in 20 overs (Venkatesh Iyer 57, Yuzvendra Chahal 4/25, Trent Boult 2/15) Rajasthan Royals nine wickets in 13.1 overs 151/1 in 13.1 overs (Yashasvi Jaiswal not out, Sanju Samson 48 not out) out) lost by wickets.
-IANS
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