IPL 2020: Match 12, RR vs KKR – Smith’s rare dismissal in powerplay, Curran’s late strikes, Rajasthan’s top-order collapse and more stats

Kolkata Knight Riders cruised to their second successive win of the IPL 2020 after they handed the Rajasthan Royals their first defeat of the tournament. Shubman Gill’s 34-ball 47 at the top and Eoin Morgan’s unbeaten 23-ball 34 towards the end pushed the Knight Riders to 174/6 in 20 overs. In reply, the Royals collapsed to 42/5 by 8th overs due to a collective effort from the KKR pacers. The spin bowlers saw through the second half as the Royals finished with 137/9 with help of Tom Curran’s 54*.

Here are all the statistical highlights from Rajasthan Royals’ 37-run defeat in their 150th IPL match:
A rare instance of KKR batting first against Royals:
4 – The Wednesday’s game was only the 4th instance of Kolkata Knight Riders batting first against Rajasthan Royals in the IPL. Across the 21 meetings in the league, the Royals batted first against KKR on 17 occasions. Royals found themselves batting second three times in the past four meetings against KKR after 15 successive matches of batting first against them.

One of the Royals’ worst top-order performance:
35 – The top five batters of Rajasthan collective aggregated 45 runs which are the 3rd fewest number of runs they aggregated during an IPL match. The Royals’ top five amassed only 26 runs and 28 runs respectively against KXIP and RCB during the 2009 season game hosted by Cape Town.

Curran saves Royals from embarrassment:
54* – Tom Curran’s unbeaten 54 is only the 3rd fifty while batting at No.7 or lower in the IPL recorded for the Rajasthan Royals. Yusuf Pathan scored an unbeaten 62 off 30 balls against Delhi Daredevils in 2009 while Brad Hodge also scored exactly 54* against Sunrisers Hyderabad in the 2013 Eliminator.

A rare powerplay dismissal for Smith:
10 – Steve Smith has been dismissed in the first six overs of an IPL inning for the first time across ten occasions. His last dismissals in the powerplay overs came during the 2017 Qualifier against MI. Between his last two powerplay dismissals, Smith amassed 116 runs facing 94 deliveries.

Bowlers chip in with wickets:
11 – 11 players taking at least a wicket in this match equals the record of most players with a wicket during an IPL match. This is overall the 6th match in IPL history where 11 bowlers claimed at least one wicket.

2/13 – Kamlesh Nagarkoti’s figures of 2/13 were the best individual bowling figures in the whole match. Thus, this game between RR and KKR became only the 3rd IPL match without a 3-wicket haul despite bowlers picking up 15+ wickets in the match. The 2009 season matches including Chennai Super Kings against RCB and KXIP in Durban were the previous such instances.

Nagarkoti stars in the field:
3 – Kamlesh Nagarkoti became only the 3rd player to pick 2+ wickets, claim 2+ catches and also hit a boundary in the same IPL match for the Kolkata Knight Riders. Sourav Ganguly against Deccan Chargers in 2008 and Andre Russell in 2015 and 2019 respectively against KXIP and MI recorded the treble for KKR. Overall, Nagarkoti is the 9th Indian to achieve this treble in an IPL match.

A rare six by No.11:
8 – Ankit Rajpoot became only the 8th player to hit a six in the IPL while batting at No.11. In this process, Rajasthan Royals became the first team to have recorded two sixes from No.11 batters as Siddharth Trivedi hit a maximum for them back in 2010.