It was not as imperious or important as the famous six he had hit in a World Cup final in Mumbai 14 years ago. But the yellow faithful who outnumbered the purple-and-gold at Eden Gardens will take this six from MS Dhoni in the last over. It was struck slightly wider of long-on than that Wankhede one and practically ended Kolkata Knight Riders campaign in IPL 2025.
Chasing 180 to win and five down inside the first six overs despite an 11-ball 31 from Urvil Patel, Chennai Super Kings owed this come-from-behind win to Dewald Brevis and Shivam Dube. They revived the innings with a partnership of 67 in just over six overs. Mostly taking singles other than blocking, Dhoni was on 10 off 15 when he struck Andre Russell for that six in the last over. The defeat left the defending champions only with a mathematical chance, on 11 points from 12 matches. CSK remain at the bottom with six from 12.
The only positive for CSK after losing those wickets in the powerplay was the run rate. They were going at around 10 per over and Brevis (52 off 25) and Dube (45 off 40) pushed it further up. The youngster from South Africa struck Vaibhav Arora for 30 runs in the 11th over of the innings, which more or less settled the match, although things became close towards the end.
Varun Chakravarthy and Sunil Narine brought KKR back in it and bowled tidy overs. The former took two wickets, including that of Brevis soon after that expensive over. But KKR’s principal spinners had finished their quota by the 14th over. The last six overs bowled by others proved costly. Dube hit some timely sixes and Dhoni got that important one in the end.
KKR needed around 200 to put CSK to a sterner test, but kept losing their set batters. This kept them from building a momentum and maintaining it. Narine (26 off 17), Ajinkya Rahane (48 of 33), Manish Pandey (36 off 28) and Russell (38 off 21) made contributions but got out when their team wanted them to be in the middle. This made the difference between a modest and imposing total.
“We were 10-15 runs short,” said Rahane after the match. “Bowlers bowled really well, but tough to be on the losing side. One over here and there can change the momentum. They (Brevis and Dube) took their chances and it paid off. All about being brave and they were really brave. No complaints at all, the bowlers tried their best.”
