' Warne could not resist playing Tendulkar '

He was almost ruled out of rest of the Indian Premier League [Images] owing to his hamstring injury but Rajasthan Royals [Images] captain Shane Warne [Images] made a surprise appearance against Mumbai Indians [Images] as he did not want to miss possibly his only chance to play Sachin Tendulkar [Images] in the Twenty20 [Images] tournament, in Durban.

The previous match between the two teams was washed out so with Tendulkar again on the opposite side on Thursday there was "no way to stop" Warne, who had his leg strapped up, says Rajasthan Royals Director of Coaching Darren Berry.

"We, Jeremy [Snape], the physio, and I gave Shane every warning against playing today. You would have needed a semi trial to stop Shane from playing against the Mumbai Indians. With Sachin Tendulkar in their team, there was no way to stop him," Barry said.

"His leg was strapped up but he said he was playing. And when he says he is playing, it doesn't matter what we are saying," he was quoted as saying by the official IPL website.

Acknowledging man-of-the-match Warne's role in the victory, Barry also showered lavish praise on all his boys for their collective effort to pull off the win in the nerve-wrecking encounter.

"I think without a doubt all the players look up to him [Warne]. He is one of the greats of all time. He enjoys an enormous amount of respect among our group. But, to be honest, it was actually a collective effort from all our players. He is a wonderful captain. Tactically, very good. The guys believe in him and that is important," Barry said.

On featuring in so many close matches, Barry said "Rajasthan Royals have played quite a few of those in the last couple of years. Last year we had two on the last ball and one on the penultimate ball against Deccan Chargers.

"Tonight [Thursday] I think, the most pleasing aspect from our point of view is that we came out on a winning side. It was also a great game of cricket. Both the sides really had a crack at it and it was fantastic. Warne vs Tendulkar -- it doesn't get better than this," he added.

Barry also lauded the efforts of Munaf Patel [Images] and Rob Quiney for their role in the victory.

"Rob Quiney's innings at the top was important. To come back into the team and get a half-century at the top was good.

"Full credit to Munaf Patel. The last over and four runs to defend with seven wickets down and he pulled it off. I think three wickets fell for just one run. It was all happening towards the end. When it came to the last over I am sure that most of the people would have had their money on Mumbai Indians. Munaf and Rajasthan Royals pulled off a great victory," he said.

Tough ask for Knight Riders against Kings XI

Port Elizabeth, May 2 (IANS) Kings XI Punjab will come out all guns blazing against bottom placed Kolkata Knight Riders at the St.George's Park here Sunday to get back to winning ways in the Indian Premier League (IPL).

Despite being robbed by rain in two matches early on in the league, Kings XI have bounced back well with three wins on the trot before being stopped by Royal Challengers Friday night.

In contrast Knight Riders are in deep trouble. Having lost five of seven matches, they are lying at the bottom of the league. Things are simply not going their way and despite coming close on the last two occasions against Royal Challengers and Mumbai Indians, they had to end on the losing side.

The team management has to do some serious brainstorming to find a winning combination. Knight Riders look like a disjointed lot and skipper Brendon McCullum has done hardly anything to lead his team from the front.

Team co-owner Shah Rukh Khan has asked Knight Riders' fans to keep faith and hoped that his boys will bounce back again.

'So let's start from the fact that yes we have been hit already. So this is a good thing. A very good thing! We have been hit and hit hard, so the difficult part is over now. We all should accept that, we do lie at this point very nearly on the floor. So now comes the part, which is more important. The part that we need to show everyone around us, that we can take a hit; we can fall down; but we also know how to scrape ourselves from the floor and continue to fight,' Shah Rukh wrote on his blog on the team website.

Though Shah Rukh's confidence is good news for Knight Riders but the bad news is that their top performer Chris Gayle is likely to miss the encounter. The West Indies captain, who has been in superb form with both bat and ball, will leave for England to lead his team in the first Test starting Wednesday.

But it is the form of Australian Brad Hodge and South African Morne van Wyk, which will bring back smiles to the Knight Riders camp. Both the batsmen played well against Mumbai Indians and got Knight Riders to sniffing distance of the elusive win.

In all it will need an all-round performance from the Knight Riders to get a win against Kings XI.

For Kings XI, their skipper Yuvraj Singh's form was a worry. But Yuvraj came out with a splendid performance Friday night, picking up a hat-trick and a half-century. His efforts were not enough to save Kings XI from a defeat but will send a strong signal to other teams. Even Kings XI's bowling looks good with both Yusuf Abdulla and Irfan Pathan troubling the batsmen.

It is definitely going to be a tough ask for Knight Riders against Kings XI.

Yuvraj hat-trick for Punjab fails to stop Bangalore

02 May 2009

By Jason Humphries

DURBAN (Reuters) - A fine all-round performance by Yuvraj Singh was not enough to prevent Kings XI Punjab slumping to an eight-run loss against the Bangalore Royal Challengers in the Indian Premier League (IPL) on Friday.

Punjab captain Yuvraj took a hat-trick to help restrict Bangalore to 145 for nine at Kingsmead before blasting a superb half-century only to see his side lose two wickets in the last over of their innings to finish on 137 for seven.

Punjab began the last over of their innings needing 13 runs to win but medium pacer Praveen Kumar held his nerve to allow a single boundary and capture two wickets.

Yuvraj earlier removed Robin Uthappa (19) and Jacques Kallis (27) with the fifth and sixth balls of the 11th over before trapping Mark Boucher lbw with the first ball of the 13th for the first hat-trick of this season's IPL and the fourth overall.

India's Yuvraj claimed figures of 3-22, while left-arm seamer Yusuf Abdulla captured 4-36 making him the leading wicket-taker in this year's IPL with 13 wickets in six matches.

Right-handed South African Roelof van der Merwe rescued Bangalore's innings with a blazing cameo of 35 off 19 balls with three fours and three sixes after Bangalore had been reduced to 84 for six after Yuvraj's three-wicket burst.

QUICK-FIRE FIFTY

Yuvraj, who had opened the batting for Punjab, struck a quick-fire 50 off 34 balls with three fours and four sixes in a first-wicket stand with Karan Goel (20) of 70 runs off 60 balls.

However, Bangalore's bowlers fought back with Kumar, leg spinner Anil Kumble and left-arm spinner van der Merwe ending with two wickets apiece as Punjab lost five for 67 runs.

The result lifts Bangalore to fifth place with six points from seven games, two off the pace set by Deccan Chargers, while Punjab stay fourth on six points having played six matches.

Earlier, an unbeaten half-century from JP Duminy helped the Mumbai Indians to a nine-run win over the Kolkata Knight Riders. The result moved Mumbai up to third place on seven points while Kolkata remained rooted to the bottom with just three points.

Duminy scored 52 not out off 37 balls with four sixes and a boundary as Mumbai posted 148 for six before restricting Kolkata to 139 for six in East London.

Opening batsman Sachin Tendulkar got Mumbai off to a decent start with a score of 34 off 30 balls before the elegant Duminy provided Mumbai's innings with some much needed momentum.

His team had struggled to 96 for five after 15.5 overs at a run-rate of slightly over six runs to the over.

Kolkata came in and looked in control of the match thanks to an 89-run third-wicket partnership off 77 balls from Australian Brad Hodge and South African Morne van Wyk (32).

But when the right-handed Van Wyk was caught at long-on in the 15th over and Hodge was run out for 73 off 60 balls with five fours and three sixes after 19 overs Kolkata's fate was sealed.

Mumbai seamer Zaheer Khan finished with 3-31.