Kolkata, May 15
Dwayne Bravo smashed a last-ball six as Chennai Super Kings pulled off a stunning five-wicket win over Kolkata Knight Riders in a dramatic Indian Premier League match to keep their hopes of a play-off berth alive here yesterday.

With five runs required from the last ball, Bravo (11 not out off seven balls) smashed Rajat Bhatia for a six over long on to stun a jampacked crowd at Eden Gardens.

Chasing 159 for a win, Michael Hussey (39 from 56 balls) and Murali Vijay (36 from 25 balls) set the platform with a 97-run stand from 10.2 overs for the opening wicket.

But Sunil Narine's mystery bowling, in which he claimed 2/14, swung the momentum in favour of KKR before Chennai skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni (28 balls from 21 balls) set up the match nicely, taking 18 runs from the penultimate over bowled by Marchant de Lange.

Nine runs were required from the last over but with Dhoni being dismissed when he was bowled by a slower ball by Bhatia in the second ball, the match went down to the wire.

Aiming to send the ball out of the park, Bravo miscued one delivery in the penultimate ball when his bat slipped out of his hands on to the midwicket to take the match to a last ball finish.

With the win today, Chennai climbed to fourth spot in the table to with 17 points from 15 matches, the same as KKR who occupied the third spot with a better net run rate.

The win also avenged Chennai's first-leg defeat at home against the same opponents.

Gambhir pulled Hilfenhaus over square leg while McCullum came down the track to hit him over mid-on in the same over to unsettle the Aussie's rhythm as his second over yielded 11 runs.

The left-handed skipper hit Shadab Jakati for a six and followed it up with a boundary as KKR raced to 50 for no loss in the sixth over.

Nothing went Chennai way as Jakati dropped a sitter from McCullum in the same over when the New Zealander was on 11.

Gambhir notched his sixth fifty of the season from 31 balls that included five fours and three sixes. Dhoni tried his best bringing in six bowlers midway into their innings but the KKR duo looked unstoppable.

McCullum also started firing from the other end hitting Raina for a six as things started to look ominous for Chennai.

The duo bettered their previous best stand of 95 (vs Royal Challengers Bangalore) but a rare mix up in the middle and a direct hit by Dhoni yielded the visitors the much-needed breakthrough in 11.3 overs.

McCullum had almost reached midway into the strip for a second run when Gambhir shouted a no and that cost the Kiwi's wicket.

Having conceded 17 runs from his first two overs, Jakati made a successful return in his second spell that yielded two wickets for nine with prized scalps of Kallis (4) and Gambhir to peg back the Knight Riders.

Pathan started explosively for a huge six over long-on but his run of woeful form continued as he mistimed a delivery in the very next over.

At one point, it seemed that Dhoni's ploy to field on this difficult track had backfired in their must-win match to keep their play-off hopes alive.

But another shoddy performance by KKR middle order meant that the home team was pegged back to 158 for six.

In fact, had it not been for Debabrata Das's cameo of 19 from 10 balls with two boundaries and one six, KKR could have been in trouble to reach the 150-run mark.

From 99 for no loss in 12th over, KKR were reduced to 128 for five in the 18th over as Kallis (4), Manoj Tiwary (12) and Yusuf Pathan (11) failed to capitalise on the fine start. — PTI

SCOREBOARD

Kolkata Knight Riders

Gambhir b Jakati 62

McCullum run out 37

Kallis c Ashwin b Jakati 4

Tiwari c Bravo b Jadeja 12

Yusuf c Bravo b Ashwin 11

Das not out 19

Shukla c Raina b Hilfenhaus 9

Bhatia not out 1

Extras: (lb-2, w-1) 3

Total: (6 wkts, 20 ovrs) 158

Fall of wickets: 1-99, 2-100, 3-111, 4-127, 5-128, 6-156.

Bowling: Jakati 4-0-26-2, Hilfenhaus 3-0-26-1, Ashwin 4-0-26-1, Raina 2-0-17-0, Jadeja 4-0-39-1, Bravo 3-0-22-0.

Chennai Super Kings

Mike c Bhatia b Narine 56

Vijay b Narine 36

Raina run out 8

du Plessis c Tiwari

b Bhatia 13

Dhoni b Bhatia 28

Bravo not out 11

Jadeja not out 3

Extras (lb 4, w 1) 5

Total (5 wkts, 20 ovrs) 160

Fall of wickets: 1-97, 2-97, 3-110, 4-127, 5-151.

Bowling: de Lange 3-0-37-0, Balaji 4-0-33-0, Narine 4-0-14-2, Kallis 3-0-25-0, Bhatia 4-0-33-2, Yusuf 2-0-14-0.

New Delhi, May 15
Delhi Daredevils crushed Kings XI Punjab by five wickets with one over to spare to book a berth in the play-off stage of the Indian Premier League at the Ferozeshah Kotla ground here tonight. Chasing a victory target of 137, Daredevils posted 140 for 5 in 19 overs. 

Mahela Jayawardene cracked an unbeaten 56 off 49 balls to play a stellar role in Daredevils’ 10 th win in 14 matches to log 20 points, and cement their place on the top of the table. Kings’ XI have lost their hopes of gaining a play-off berth, as they have got stuck on 14 points from 15 matches.

Daredevils were in dire straights at one stage, and it was Jayawardene’s two fruitful partnerships with Naman Ojha and Irfan Pathan that eventually clinched the match for the hosts. Pathan made 19 off ten balls, Ojha made 34, and put on a vital 58-run partnership with Jayawardene. It was Ojha’s two consecutive sixes off Piyush Chawala in the 11 th over that eased the run drought, and then Pathan punished Parvinder Awana all over in the 18 th over to take Daredevils closer to the victory target. It was ironical that Awana got hit when Kings’ needed to conserve runs as after a dream first spell of 2-0-5-3, the Punjab pacer went for 22 runs in 4 overs.

Chasing 137 for victory, Delhi Daredevils almost repeated the hara-kiri they committed against Chennai Super Kings when the top order caved in to struggle at 4 for 37.

David Warner and Virender Sehwag departed in the space of seven runs, as the hosts fell from 20 for no loss in the second over to 2 for 28. Then Venugopal Rao and Ross Taylor fell off successive balls of Awana for the score of 37 and Daredevils were in deep waters. But two consecutive straight sixes by Naman Ojha off Chawla revived the Delhi hopes as they slowly, but surely, recovered from the deadly blows inflicted by Awana. Chawla’s first two costly overs were the balm Daredevils needed to apply on their wounds to stage a recovery.

Earlier, Some disciplined bowling and sharp fielding, with captain Virender Sehwag leading the way by plucking two neat catches, to celebrate his 50 th match as Daredevils’ captain, restricted Kings’ XI Punjab to 136 for 8. The visitors, electing to bat, would not have reached even this modest total, but for David Hussey’s unbeaten 40, made off 35 balls

Varun Aaron struck a wicket each in his first two overs to remove Shaun Marsh and Mandeep Singh to put Kings XI on the back-foot, to reduce them to 1 for 24 and 2 for 43 in 5.3 overs, which pegged back the run flow. Kings could never really recover from this twin blow and Umesh Yadav virtually made it a hopeless case for Punjab, when he too claimed a wicket each in his initial overs. Umesh ended up with three for 21, while Aaron was responsible for Praveen Kumar’s run out to emerge as the wreckers of Kings.

Umesh tasted blood off the second ball of his very first over, forcing a struggling Nitin Saini to swat on the off side, and into the right hand of captain Virender Sehwag at slip, as Kings lost their third wicket with the addition of just 11 more runs. Pawan Negi’s direct throw caught David Miller short of crease before Umesh struck to remove Mahmood.

Mumbai, May 15
Thirsting for revenge and desperate to arrest their two-match losing streak in the ongoing Indian Premier League, Kolkata Knight Riders would settle for nothing less than a victory in their return leg clash against Mumbai Indians here tomorrow.

But it won't be easy for KKR as Mumbai Indians, with 18 points from 14 matches, hold an edge over the visitors and a victory in their last home game tomorrow will definitely cement the Harbhajan Singh-led side's place in the second stage of the competition.

KKR, who suffered back-to-back defeats in their last two games - against MI and holders Chennai Super Kings - at the home venue of Eden Gardens, are a point adrift of their rivals with 17 in their kitty from 14 games.

But a win against Mumbai tomorrow at the Wankhede Stadium would virtually seal KKR’s place in the four-team play-offs ahead of their final round-robin game against the struggling Pune Warriors on May 19.

KKR, however, need to dust off the stunning last-ball defeat against Chennai last night in their final home game of the season if they desire to match the highly confident Mumbai outfit, whose main adversary playing in their backyard has been the uncertain nature of the wickets.

On wickets that have helped batsmen, MI have been on roll, but on wickets that have either seamed around or helped spin bowlers overtly, their mighty batting line-up has struggled a bit - indicated by their 3-4 win-loss record at home this season.

Mumbai have turned it around after being comprehensively outplayed by the Royal Challengers Bangalore at the Wankhede Stadium on May 9. They defeated KKR and RCB away from home in back-to-back games to stand on the threshold of qualifying for the next stage of the competition.

If it was Rohit Sharma who flattened KKR with a brilliant unbeaten 109, his maiden IPL ton, it was another talented youngster - Ambati Rayudu - who stole the win for MI against RCB last night in Bangalore with a brilliant 81 not out off 54 balls.

Though Sachin Tendulkar failed to prosper in both these matches, getting out to single-digit scores, MI would be heartened by the performance of Rohit, their leading run-getter this season with 407 from 14 games, and Rayudu.

The availability of South African Herschelle Gibbs - to open the innings with Tendulkar - has lent the cutting edge to the home team's fielding.

However, the flip side of Mumbai's batting has been the inconsistent showing of its number three batsman Rohit, who has fired in one match and then flopped in another.

And KKR know very well that Rohit is the batsman to be stopped at all costs along with Tendulkar and the big-hitting Kieron Pollard whose return from a shoulder injury has galvanised the team's stuttering form.

Mumbai's bowling has been a mixed bag right throughout the tournament with the exception of Lasith Malinga, who heads their wicket-takers' list with 20 scalps from 11 games.

And Malinga would continue to pose serious danger to the rival batsmen whenever he operates.

But none exemplify the inconsistency of Mumbai's bowling other than Munaf Patel, whose 14 wickets from 11 games have cost him plenty of runs.

The lanky pacer lost the plot for his team against Bangalore yesterday, giving away a 24-run over to Mayank Agarwal with his wayward bowling at the death.

Skipper Harbhajan Singh, who was fined for slow over rate yesterday, has also been inconsistent after slipping into the groove of late.

But luckily for Mumbai, Pollard has been very consistent with the ball while Rudra Pratap Singh and Pragyan Ojha have also witnessed mixed bag outings so far.

On the other hand, Gautam Gambhir has led KKR from the front with the bat, scoring 519 runs from 13 games.

Jacques Kallis (297 from 13) and Brendon McCullum (216 from 9) have done well in patches, but the poor showing of the middle-order would be a serious concern for Gambhir going into their last two league encounters.

A major let-down for KKR in both batting and bowling has been Yusuf Pathan, who has done precious little barring a cameo of 40 not out against MI. His tally of 117 runs and a lone wicket in 13 games has been below par. — PTI

Patiala, May 15
A senior Punjab Police officer, recently recruited as a DSP by the state government, is under the scanner of the National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA) for evading dope testers for the past one year.

Finally, NADA has decided to write to the Punjab Police and serve a notice, under specific rules, to the concerned athlete who could face a NADA panel hearing.

Meanwhile, NADA has provisionally suspended three athletes and caught a total of four following tests during the 16th Federation Cup National Senior Athletics Championship held at NIS Patiala from April 21 to 23. However, the DSP evaded giving any sample during the same event.

Highly placed sources at NIS confirmed to The Tribune that the 400m sprinter from Punjab evaded the NADA team during the recently concluded Federation Cup in Punjab on one pretext or the other.

“Later, she announced that she has already given in writing to the Athletics Federation of India (AFI) that she was not interested in participating in athletics anymore,” they said.

The 400m Punjab runner has been on the NADA radar since the last inter-state meet in Bangalore in 2011, but made some excuses and escaped from NIS Bangalore without giving any samples.

Director General, NADA, Rahul Bhatnagar told The Tribune that under the World Anti Doping Agency (WADA) clause 10.3, NADA would soon serve a notice to the state government to ask the athlete to appear before our Anti-Disciplinary Panel and defend her case.

“She cannot refuse a dope test on any plea and we have even written to the AFI”, he added.

Director AFI ML Dogra said that the Punjab athlete has already made it clear that she has given up athletics and therefore, the AFI cannot force her to give any samples.

“Now, it is in between NADA and the athlete as she is not covered by the where-about clause of WADA,” he added.

Patiala, May 15
Asian champion L Sarita Devi (60 kg), who created waves after defeating second seeded Tatar Gulsum from Turkey yesterday, lost to her English opponent Natasha Jonas by a small margin of three points today to bow out of the 7th AIBA World Women Boxing Championships at Qinhuangdao, China.

But there is still a chance that she might qualify for the Olympics, depending on the performance of Jonas.

As there are only two Olympic spots in the 60kg category in the Asian quota, one Asian player from Tajikistan Chorieva Mavzuna has already qualified for the Olympics as she is the sole Asian player left in the medal fray.

The player who qualifies for London Olympics on the remaining spot will be the one whose opponent wins a gold in this weight category.

Meanwhile, India’s top hope MC Mary Kom advanced to the next round defeating Marielle Hanasen from Norway by a comfortable margin of 18-6. She will now fight Nicola Adams from England in the next round.

Continuing her good form in the 48kg weight category, Pinki Jangra drubbed Lidia Ion of Romania 26-16 and moved to the next round where she will meet Svetlana Gnevanova from Russia. In 64kg, Meena Rani beat Marija Stojanovic of Serbia 21-9 and will now face Joslin Mayer from USA.

New Delhi, May 15
The Indian Olympic Association (IOA) has sought Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh’s immediate intervention and support to host the South Asian Games (SAG) in Delhi early next year as scheduled.

The IOA’s plea to the Prime Minister comes in the wake of South Asian Olympic Council’s (SAOC) decision to shift the games to Kathmandu if the SAG are not held as scheduled in Delhi next year.

The SAOC decision was in response to reports that that Games were likely to be deferred to the second half of 2014.

“The rescheduling of the Games is not possible because if we don’t host the games in January/February next year, they will be shifted to Kathmandu,” IOA acting President Vijay Kumar Malhotra wrote in a letter to the PM.

“The executive committee of South Asian Olympic Council (SAOC) has decided that in case SAG are not held in India in 2013, these will be allotted to Kathmandu,” Malhotra wrote.

“So we don’t have this leeway to shift or defer the Games and then hold these when the Sports Ministry gives its clearance.

“Once the Games are moved out of the country, it will be difficult for India to conduct them in the near future, given the rotational basis on which Games are allotted. It will be a big embarrassment for India and its sporting fraternity if these are moved to another country,” Malhotra’s letter stated.

“The reasons put forth by the Sports Ministry for seeking deferment of the games are flimsy and contradictory and are not convincing,” Malhotra wrote.