Chennai Express checks into final

Mumbai, May 22 

South African skipper Faf du Plessis pulled off a Houdini act to guide Chennai Super Kings to their seventh Indian Premier League final with a stunning two-wicket victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad here on Tuesday. It’s been a fairytale comeback for Chennai to the cash-rich league after serving a two-year ban.

Chasing a modest target of 140, CSK were down in the dumps at 92/7 before du Plessis (67 off 42 balls) engineered a stunning comeback and fittingly finished the match with a straight six off Bhuvneshwar Kumar on the first ball of the last over. With 43 needed off the last three overs, opener du Plessis tore into Carlos Brathwaite in the 18th over, plundering 20 runs with two sixes and two fours. Having done precious little in the tournament so far, the right-hander put his hand up when it mattered the most.

Bowling the penultimate over, Siddarth Kaul conceded 17 runs, including two streaky boundaries behind the wicket, leaving Kumar just six runs to defend in the final over. Du Plessis took just one ball to seal the deal, smashing a straight six on the first ball.

Lone warrior

Banned for two seasons on charges of corruption, the most successful franchise in the IPL history played like a team possessed. However, Sunrisers’ bowlers deserve a lot of credit for almost taking their team into the final despite defending a below-par total. They ran through Chennai’s top-order, with Shane Watson edging Kumar’s delivery to the keeper, Kaul castling Suresh Raina (22 off 13 balls) and in-form Ambati Rayudu (0) off successive deliveries, and then Rashid Khan accounting for MS Dhoni and Dwayne Bravo.

Du Plessis, however, waged a lone battle as wickets fell in a heap at the other end with Sandeep Sharma also joining the party and getting rid of Ravindra Jadeja and Deepak Chahar.

Earlier, the CSK bowlers utilised the lively conditions to restrict Hyderabad to a modest 139/7. Effective seam bowling in Powerplay overs swung the game towards the two-time champions early on. They didn’t let the Sunrisers batsmen off the hook, except towards the end when Carlos Brathwaite (43 off 29 balls) laid into Shardul Thakur.  On Wednesday, Kolkata Knight Riders will take on Rajasthan Royals in the Eliminator to decide who will face Sunrisers in Qualifier 2. — PTI