SRH vs KKR, Qualifier 1 at Ahmedabad, IPL, May 21 2024 - Match Result

KKR will be one of the finalists in IPL 2024. Who will join them? SRH will have another chance to make it but it has to be a heck of a bounce-back. Rajasthan Royals and Royal Challengers Bengaluru are the other teams in contention, who will play in the Eliminator tomorrow. Join us then to find out which of them will join SRH, first, for Qualifier 2, and then the final. Thanks for joining.

Mitchell Starc, POTM: We know the importance of the powerplay. These two sides have done the best there and early wickets make a big impact. Trav and Abhishek like width, so if we swing, keep it tight with lines and bowl hard lengths, we'd get into the middle order. Good luck, I guess. Between Pat, Trav and I we've played a lot here. Liked to get Trav early, doesn't always happen. Bowlers are exciting to watch, raw attack. Lots of skillful players who haven't got a chance yet too. Been great to see them first-hand and have got a lot of wickets in the IPL, and will for India as well.

Shreyas Iyer, KKR captain: Elated. Everyone came and chipped in with responsibility. The rejuvenation was important. It's not easy when you keep travelling across states. We stayed in the present which was important. We maximised every opportunity we got. The way each and every bowler stood up to the occasion (was great). We struck even when the rate went up. Their attitude was great always. When you have variety and the way they have been bowling has been great. No one's taking things lightly, support staff and management are important too. Gurbaz came in and got an impactful start for us, Sunil took the momentum, which the middle-order batters carried on. The only difference between me and Venkatesh is I don't speak (but understand) Tamil. He speaks to me in Tamil. Hope to enjoy the moment and be in the zone for the final.

Shah Rukh Khan goes on a lap across the ground with his children, has some fun with the broadcasters too as we await the presentation.

Deepankar DM : "So, Starc is already in the final. Either it'll be Cummins-Head, Maxwell-Green...only RR don't have a real aussie beast in the XI but they still have Zampa. So either ways, Australia's world cup winners will lift the IPL trophy.. they don't know how to stop winning titles, do they?

Venkatesh Iyer has a bit of fun: I just wanted to go in and bat. We last played on 11th and I wanted to showcase my talent. I didn't imagine we'd get them all out for 160. Credit to our bowlers. In a tournament like this, momentum is important. We've seen that with RCB, we wanted that and have been playing good cricket. We didn't get to play the last game but were table-toppers, that gave us confidence. Owners have been great, SRK gave a pep talk. Were pumped to go out and put up a good show. (On the final) Always special, opportunity. It's a dreamy movement. Coming here first in front of an amazing crowd. Now we have a realistic chance of winning too. We were raring to go out. Touchwood, all bowlers have picked wickets. We wanted to field well, Rinku has been amazing in hotspots. To go out with excitement and do it for the franchise.

Pat Cummins, SRH captain: Try to put this day behind quickly, good thing we have another crack at it. We were off the pace. You have these days in T20 cricket, when it doesn't work out. We didn't get enough starts but didn't go on with bat. Not good with the ball. Sunny (Sanvir) played the last game, we were hoping not to use the batting sub to use Umran but felt the batting was important (due to the situation). (Was there an instinct this would go bad) No. Thought KKR bowled well and the wicket got better, it did a bit early. It happens. Think it's easy to move on, going to a new venue helps. You start again. We have a good body of work too. To sum it up, nothing went their way.

10:45pm: A knockout match between the top-two sides ended up almost as a non-event. This could've been top vs bottom. SRH won the toss and batted, that was the last thing they won tonight. KKR barraged them by attacking first with the ball at the powerplay and the death. The same happened in their batting powerplay, thanks to Gurbaz and Narine, and it continued in the middle overs which meant that it didn't even need to go to the death. Gurbaz and Narine's wickets were non-issues as the Iyers continued to press charge and finished the chase with checks notes almost 40 balls to spare. SRH's bowling was wayward at times but taken down at all times. Fielding was bad too.

Rajkumar Lingav: "Head usually scores 10 ball 32 runs. For a change he concedes that while bowling."

Around the wicket

Karthik Rao: "Is there anything I can contribute to make SRH win today ?" Imagine, maybe

Around

Nitish now on. Harsha Bhogle mentions how SRH have had to resort to Head, and now Nitish, because of having to use Sanvir as the impact sub

murali: "This is a complete rout!!"

Vismay: "@Cummins and Head - what you're feeling now is what every Indian fan felt on that WC final night. Hopeless. "

Rama: "Travis doing it 6 months too late...the bad day at office"

Head brought on