Why did MS Dhoni go with David Hussey for the final over? That's the question IPL fans will be asking after a gripping low-scoring encounter on a spinning Ranchi track went down to 10 off the final over.
The ball was turning square, and Dhoni had three options: legspinner Samuel Badree, who had figures of 3-0-15-0, Mohit Sharma, who has been one of the standout bowlers of the tournament, and Hussey, who had no playing contract and was part of the IPL commentary team till last week.
This was also Hussey's first game since March, he has bowled more than one over only once in his previous 14 Twenty20 matches, and had conceded 25 in his two overs on the day.
Still, Dhoni went with Hussey, perhaps wanting the ball to turn away from the main remaining threat, Yuvraj Singh. Dhoni has famously made unconventional bowling choices towards the end of an innings to conjure victories, but this was not one of those occasions.
Yuvraj mowed the first ball over wide long-on for six, and the game was effectively over. With four needed off five deliveries, it was too little for Super Kings to play with. Abu Nechim clubbed a boundary to long-on to complete the game off the penultimate delivery.
Despite making only 138, Super Kings looked to be in control of the game for most of the chase. R Ashwin was outstanding with the new ball, giving away only three in three overs as he repeatedly made Chris Gayle look clueless. He would have sealed the game in the 15th over had he pouched an overhead chance off AB de Villiers at extra cover.
De Villiers was yet to get off the mark then, and the asking-rate was over 10 - perhaps par for the course for Twenty20s, but incredibly tough on this surface.
On a track where even Gayle and Virat Kohli struggled to get the ball away, de Villiers was at ease, pummelling the ball to all parts as he scored at a strike-rate of 200. Three sixes in successive overs had brought the asking-rate down to a run-a-ball, but de Villiers went for another big hit in the 18th to perish and leave Yuvraj the job of hitting 14 off the final two overs.
There was drama as Yuvraj missed three deliveries from Ravindra Jadeja in the 19th, to leave 10 for the final over. Hussey was given the responsibility, but he couldn't pull it off.
He hadn't looked at ease with the bat either, after coming in following a rare early fall of Super Kings' openers. Suresh Raina and Hussey, however, put on 75 for the third wicket as Super Kings seemed set for their patented formula of bludgeoning the bowling in the second half.
Though Raina went on to make 62, there was to be no bludgeoning as first the spinners Muttiah Muralitharan and Yuzvendra Chahal stifled the batsmen, before Abu Nechim and Mitchell Starc did the same at the death.
Though Raina went on to make 62, there was to be no bludgeoning as first the spinners Muttiah Muralitharan and Yuzvendra Chahal stifled the batsmen, before Abu Nechim and Mitchell Starc did the same at the death.
Dhoni, dismissed only once in his previous seven innings, fell for 7, and there were no boundaries in the final four overs as Starc and Nechim profited by bowling a full length.
The result isn't too much of a blow for Super Kings, who are still almost certain of making the playoffs, but was huge for Royal Challengers as it kept them alive and hoping.
Kolkata Knight Riders 146 for 3 (Uthappa 40, Yusuf 39*) beat Sunrisers Hyderabad 142 for 8 (Warner 34, Umesh 3-26) by seven wickets
Just past the halfway point of the Sunrisers Hyderabad innings, speaking to the TV commentators, Shikhar Dhawan said his team were looking at getting to 180 on what he called a "beautiful batting wicket". Dhawan's assessment was probably right, and Sunrisers, at that point, were on course to get to 180, going by their run rate, and going by how David Warner was batting.
But they had lost three wickets at that point, and they lost two more in the next two overs, including that of Warner, for an 18-ball 34. In the 40 balls that remained after Warner's dismissal, Sunrisers scored just 38 runs. It left Kolkata Knight Riders chasing a target of 143, and they achieved it without too much of a struggle, losing only three wickets, with four of their five batsmen scoring 25 or more.
The one batsman who didn't was their captain Gautam Gambhir, who was given out caught behind off Dale Steyn, perhaps unluckily. There seemed to be a fairly big gap between Gambhir's outside edge and the ball, but he made his feelings known in perhaps too vociferous a manner to elude the match referee's eye.
Knight Riders were 8 for 1 at that point. Robin Uthappa and Manish Pandey, both helped along by dropped catches, steadied the chase with a 51-run second-wicket partnership, before Yusuf Pathan and Ryan ten Doeschate struck some important blows at the end to make sure Knight Riders always kept pace with the asking rate.
Towards the end, Sunrisers kept things interesting with a couple of tight overs. The equation went from 40 from 30 to 30 from 18, after Karn Sharma and Irfan Pathan gave away only 10 from the 16th and 17th overs. Yusuf immediately swung the first ball of the next over, from Bhuvneshwar Kumar, over midwicket for six. Dale Steyn gave away just six from the 19th over, to leave Knight Riders needing 10 from the last over.
Ten Doeschate coolly sliced the second ball of the over - Bhuvneshwar the bowler once again - over the cover boundary for six. It was a shot that reinforced a simple fact: Knight Riders were only chasing 143.
It could have been so much more, but Sunrisers, even though they began brightly from a run-rate point of view, lost far too many wickets far too soon. It was a particularly dangerous thing to do for a line-up as top-heavy as theirs.
Knight Riders' bowlers didn't contribute too much to the dismissals of Sunrisers' big-name batsmen. Aaron Finch went hard at an Umesh Yadav outswinger and edged a simple catch to third man. Dhawan - having been replaced as captain by Sammy - played some sparkling shots through the off side before top-edging a slog sweep - a shot he might not have wanted to attempt in Sunil Narine's first over.
Naman Ojha looked in superb touch, hitting two crisp straight sixes, before slicing a wide, full ball from Shakib Al Hasan straight to point. Warner, after a breezy start, pulled a short ball from Umesh straight to midwicket.
All this left Irfan and Sammy batting together in the 14th over. Both batsmen are perfectly suited to coming in towards the end of an innings and launching off immediately, but neither is particularly suited to starting their innings against spin.
Sammy, in particular, was an ungainly sight against Narine and Piyush Chawla, heaving at them after a massive wind-up of his bat and timing absolutely nothing.
Pathan looked a little better, sweeping and lofting Chawla for two fours in the 17th over, but that over - which brought 12 runs - came completely against the run of play. Those two fours were the only boundaries Sunrisers hit in the last six overs.
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