Kane Williamson suffered an injury to his right knee while attempting a tricky catch during Gujarat Titans' victory to begin the defence of their IPL crown against Chennai Super Kings on Friday; Ben Stokes (7) and Moeen Ali (23) had helped Chennai to 178-7
Saturday 1 April 2023 10:34, UK
Gujarat Titans began their Indian Premier League title defense by beating Chennai Super Kings by five wickets at the possible cost of star batsman Kane Williamson on Friday.
Chennai opener Ruturaj Gaekwad made 92 off 50 balls in their 178-7.
Shubman Gill led Gujarat's run chase with 63 off 36 balls and, despite three wickets on his IPL debut by 20-year-old fast bowler Rajvardhan Hangargekar, the home team cruised to 182-5 in 19.2 overs.
"We were very happy with 178 because at one point they looked like going past 200," Gujarat skipper Hardik Pandya said.
"My shot (out) and Shubman's shot put the team in a difficult position. We have some standards inside the dressing room. We have to finish the games, and not Rash (Rashid Khan) and Rahul (Tewatia) all the time."
Williamson hurt his right knee while attempting a difficult catch on the edge of the boundary and left the field in obvious pain.
In his absence, Gujarat replaced him with their impact player pick Sai Sudharsan, who scored 22 off 17 balls.
Chennai's impact player also made little difference. Fast bowler Tushar Deshpande shared the new ball after replacing Ambati Raydu, and returned expensive figures of 1-51.
In the last over, Tewatia finished the game with a six and a straight boundary, while Rashid was unbeaten on 10 from a six and a four.
Gaekwad smashed three sixes against Gujarat's Alzarri Joseph in his first over and was solid against the legspin of Rashid, who did, however, bag Moeen Ali (23) and Ben Stokes (7) in successive overs.
Rayudu struggled for a run-a-ball 12 before he was clean bowled by Josh Little as Chennai slipped to 121-4 in the 13th over.
Gaekwad, after nine sixes and four boundaries, missed out on a deserved century when Joseph's full toss was sliced and gave an easy catch at long-on in the 18th over. Joseph was brilliant at the death as he avoided conceded a boundary while giving up just 15 runs in his return spell of three overs.
"Another 15-20 runs would have been good," Chennai skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni said. "We could have batted properly in the middle overs as opposed to trying to muscle the ball."
