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Delhi Capitals vs Kolkata Knight Riders, IPL 2025: KKR’s all-around show got their fourth win of the season against a tired-looking DC, who succumbed to a second consecutive loss.
Delhi Capitals vs Kolkata Knight Riders, IPL 2025: Full Match Analysis, Key Moments & Standout Performers (AP)
Delhi Capitals vs Kolkata Knight Riders, IPL 2025: Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) finally showed some glimpses of being defending champions with a 14-run victory over Delhi Capitals (DC) at the Arun Jaitley Stadium here in New Delhi on Sunday (April 29). A complete batting show led by Angkrish Raghuvanshi’s 44 (32) took the visitors to a sizeable 204/9, where, before Sunil Narine’s three wickets overwhelmed Faf du Plessis’ 62 (45) to seal a last-over win.
IPL 2025: Delhi Capitals vs Kolkata Knight Riders – Highlights
DC started the chase like a team that knew they had conceded 10-20 runs too many after opting to bowl first. Abhishek Porel strongly cut spinner Anukul Roy’s first ball for a boundary and tried to build on it with a step-down on the second, only to slice it in the air for an easy catch at covers for Andre Russell.
Faf du Plessis showed how it’s done with a big six against Vaibhav Arora in the next over, before tonking Harshit Rana for three good boundaries in the fourth over. All the while, Karun Nair tried to rotate the strike against Roy and others, but fell prey to Arora’s perfect middle-stump yorker on the third ball of the fifth over.
Varun Chakaravarthy was given the sixth over, but he was a bit too leg-sided and a bit too quick, which earned du Plessis and KL Rahul a boundary each. The partnership looked like it could have gotten going, but it was one of those days: on the third ball of the next over, du Plessis tried to run off Narine at fine leg and Rahul perhaps didn’t expect the West Indian to get a direct hit that’d catch him short by an inch. He went for 7 (5).
Axar hit Narine for a six and du Plessis followed it up against Chakaravarthy with two fours (though, to be fair to the spinner, his partner Narine just didn’t try for the second) and a huge six to get the pressure back. With Axar batting aggressively, du Plessis got to his fifty off 31 balls and DC crossed three figures in the 11th over.
At this point, with a couple of boundaries coming every over, luck tilted in DC’s favor too. Harshit Rana appealed for a caught behind against Axar, but it wasn’t given as the ball clipped the batter’s thigh pad — where, in turn, the impact was only marginally off from showing three reds on LBW.
By the end of the 12th over, DC’s run-rate had come almost at par with the required number.
But then came the twist: Axar reached his fifty, hit a celebratory six against Narine, and got out trying to hit another when the KKR man changed his angle to around the wicket. On the last ball of the over, the in-form Tristan Stubbs was cleaned up.
Narine, leading at the time because Rahane was out with a finger injury and vice-captain Venkatesh Iyer had been subbed out, had two in no time. Roy was brought in the next over, where, despite a last-ball reverse sweep for a four from Vipraj Nigam, only eight runs came for DC.
The pressure was on and told on the set-batter, du Plessis, who holed out to deep mid-wicket to Narine’s second ball, leaving Ashutosh Sharma and Nigam at the crease as the last recognisable batters. Ashutosh was uncharacteristically cautious against the offie, and the required run-rate soared back to 13.
11 runs against Rana in the 17th over gave DC some hope, but it all fizzled out when Ashutosh reverse-slapped Chakaravarthy’s second ball of the 18th straight to backward point, and his replacement, Mitchell Starc, gave an easy catch to Rahmanullah Gurbaz on the next ball.
Nigam kept DC interested with a six to Chakaravarthy and a six and four to Harshit. He got some luck of his own when one of his square drives went to deep point and Roy hesitated for his throw, letting the batter get back just in time. But then he didn’t run after missing the last ball and Chameera was on strike, with 25 needed off the last six balls.
Chameera did the right thing with a single on the first ball, and Nigam drilled two fours. But that was all as Russell had the final laugh with a dot and a beautiful yorker to clean him up on the fifth ball. The victory was sealed by 14 runs, which could be just the lifeline they need for the coming games.
The first essay, just like the second, got off to a perfect start for KKR. Rahmanullah Gurbaz drove the maiden ball straight over Narine for a boundary and followed it with a square drive for the same result on the sixth.
Narine followed suit with a first-ball six against Dushmantha Chameera, whose over ended with a whopping 25 runs. Perhaps it was the short turnaround but signs were rife about DC being uncooked — fielders were slightly slow to get to the ball and good shots seemed to follow Kuldeep Yadav, who looked a bit out of touch.
DC bowlers didn’t try bowling many good-length balls either, so whether or not there could’ve been movement remained unanswered. Former KKR man Mitchell Starc had a nice battle of yorkers with Gurbaz, with most edges going for boundaries until the final one, which landed in the hands of the ‘keeper Porel.
Mukesh Kumar couldn’t back that up and KKR had their 50 up in 3.4 overs. Starc got his third over in the powerplay and finally bowled some good-length, but Rahane used his height to pull a beautiful six, which he followed up with two beautiful cuts for four against Mukesh. Powerplay ended at 79/1.
Nigam got Narine immediately after the powerplay. KKR gave up the left-right combination for once as Angkrish came at number 4. Axar Patel wasted no time bringing on his left-arm spin and exploited Rahane’s issues against that skill, taking out the KKR skipper on the second ball.
Angkrish hit two confidence-boosting sixes against Nigam, but Venkatesh hit a poor cross-batted hoick to Axar on the other end and lost his wicket. Rinku Singh came on and found a lot of fun against Kuldeep, which his and Angkrish’s good running between the wickets kept the runs ticking even though the rate slowed a bit
Angkrish was spot on with his footwork against Axar but not so much against Kuldeep — he even got lucky with a half-chance going down behind the wicket — and the small middle-overs phase showed why he’s more of a number three and doesn’t quite have the skills to change gears smoothly (he’s getting there, though).
The youngster got out at the perfect time — fourth ball of the 17th over — against Chameera, because Russell was waiting. DC welcomed the big man with a loud cheer.
Vipraj got the 18th over ahead of Kuldeep, who had one left, and the move worked as Rinku failed to get under one and gave an easy catch away to deep mid-wicket.
Powell got his first boundary for KKR with a cheeky sweep to fine leg on Vipraj’s last ball of a pretty good spell. The 19th showed further signs of rust with two wides to start from Chameera and Nair fumbling an easy one at the boundary, with two good hits from Russell compounding KKR’s momentum.
It all peaked when Russell hit a 100-plus-metre six that almost shattered the press box window on the first ball of Starc’s 20th over press box. But after that, DC did brilliantly to wrest the momentum as Powell got LBW, Chameera picked a stunning diving catch at deep fine to remove Roy, and Rana got run out on the next three balls. The innings ended with Chakaravarthy getting a single on the last ball to push the score to 204/9.
