DRS Glitch reaches IPL 2024 final as KKR Star angered by controversial dismissal

Kolkata Knight Riders clinched the IPL 2024 title with a comprehensive victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad on Sunday, but the summit clash was not without controversy. KKR opener Rahmanullah Gurbaz was furious after a controversial LBW decision prevented him from scoring a half-century. During the 9th over of KKR’s innings, Gurbaz attempted a sweep against Shahbaz Ahmed but the ball spun a little and hit his pads. The on-field umpire raised his finger but Gurbaz quickly took a review and the batsman seemed extremely confident that he was not out.

The third umpire checked for inside advantage but found nothing conclusive and Ravi Shastri said in the comments that ball tracking and UltraEdge are not working. The third umpire finally ruled in SRH’s favor, leaving Gurbaz visibly upset.

KKR rode on a flamboyant half-century from Venkatesh Iyer after an impressive bowling show from Andre Russell, Mitchell Starc and Harshit Rana to defeat SRH by 8 wickets in the IPL 2024 final.

After losing the toss, KKR made a clinical effort with the ball to dismiss SRH for 113, the lowest ever total in an IPL title clash.

KKR chased down the target of 114 with as many as 57 balls to spare. Venkatesh Iyer was not left out with 52 off 26 balls.

Mitchell Starc (2/14), Andre Russell (3/19) and Harshit Rana (2/24) were the most successful bowlers for the Knight Riders as SRH simply couldn’t make it to the big game.

Opting to bat first, SRH got off to a disastrous start by losing their best run-scorers Abhishek Sharma and Travis Head with just six runs on the board, with the latter being dismissed for a first-ball duck to a fine outswinger.

Before that, Abhishek was bowled by Mitchell Starc off the fifth ball of the first over, a peachy delivery opening up the left-hander before hitting the top of stump.

SRH were in all sorts of trouble when Starc accounted for the wicket of Rahul Tripathi to leave them reeling at 21/3 in the fifth over, the swing doing the trick for the KKR bowlers early on.

First change bowler Harshit Rana continued the good work and got rid of Nitish Reddy (13). Andre Russell dismissed Aiden Markram in his first over as SRH fell to 62/5 in the 11th over.

(With PTI inputs)