WATCH, MLC | Narine’s brilliance outlasts de Kock’s luck in thrilling battle

MI New York skipper Nicholas Pooran won the toss and asked LAKR to bat first with Jason Holder’s men scoring 154/8 in the allotted 20 overs. Star middle-order batter Sherfane Rutherford smashed a blistering knock of 86 runs off just 44 balls, with five fours and six sixes. The veteran MINY pacer Trent Boult displayed a sensational bowling performance, scalping four wickets at just 17 runs in his quota of four overs. Besides him, Kieron Pollard also claimed two wickets, alongside a wicket taken by Ehsan Adil and Nosthush Kenjige. Later in the second innings, MINY successfully chased down the total in 17.5 overs, scoring 155/2 courtesy of brilliant half-centuries scored by skipper Nicholas Pooran (62 runs) and opener Monank Patel (58 runs).

Meanwhile, what caught the attention and attracted the eyeballs of the fans was the interesting battle between MINY opener Quinton de Kock and the veteran LAKR spinner Sunil Narine. It all happened in the third over of the second innings during LAKR’s run chase. On the fourth ball of the over, Narine trapped De Kock in a flighted and good-length delivery on the stumps, but the field umpire turned down the LBW appeal, and the DRS call also went against the will of MINY. The same happened on the next and the fifth ball too, the appeal was loud once again, similar to the last one. It was also turned down by the umpire, Narine managed to convince the skipper Holder to take a DRS call once again, and the same fate followed MINY. But what happened on the sixth and last ball of the over was very interesting. Narine bowled a ‘back of a length’ delivery that pitched outside the sixth stump. De Kock was beaten by the turn, and the ball took the outside edge of the bat before going into the safe hands of the skipper, Jason Holder, in the first slip.

With this win, MINY have now registered two wins and six defeats in their eight matches so far in the tournament, with four points. However, their hopes of reaching the playoffs are very low considering their position in the tournament standings.

Finally!