KKR Vs SRH, IPL 2024, Qualifier 1: Kolkata Knight Riders Grab Ticket To Finale With A 8-Wicket Win - As It Happened

Kolkata Knight Riders Vs Sunrisers Hyderabad, IPL 2024, Qualifier 1 Highlights: KKR won the qualifier 1 and booked a place in the final of Indian Premier League 2024. KKR set to play their fourth final in the history of IPL. They finished the league stage as the number 1 team and they have played like the best team of the season throughout. Mitchell Starc got the Knights off to a dream start by dismissing Head for a duck and he bowled a magnificent spell in the powerplay to reduce SRH to 39/4. Tripathi and Klaasen added some pivotal runs, however, the KKR bowlers hurt them in the middle overs as Sunrisers finished with an easy total. In reply, the KKR openers gave a perfect start, while the two Iyers (Shreyas and Venkatesh) finished off the run chase with an excellent partnership for the third wicket. The chase was smashed all around the park by Shreyas towards the end. Read for all the highlights and updates of KKR Vs SRH, IPL 2024, Qualifier 1 (Scorecard | Streaming)

Kolkata Knight Riders: Nitish Rana, Rinku Singh, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Shreyas Iyer, Jason Roy, Anukul Roy, Andre Russell, Venkatesh Iyer, Suyash Sharma, Harshit Rana, Sunil Narine, Vaibhav Arora, Varun Chakravarthy, KS Bharat, Chetan Sakariya, Mitchell Starc, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Ramandeep Singh, Sherfane Rutherford, Manish Pandey, Mujeeb Ur Rahman (injured), Gus Atkinson, Sakib Hussain, Dushmantha Chameera (replacement for Gus Atkinson), Phil Salt (replacement for Jason Roy), Allah Ghazanfar (replacement for Mujeeb Ur Rahman)

Sunrisers Hyderabad: Abdul Samad, Aiden Markram, Rahul Tripathi, Glenn Phillips, Mayank Agarwal, Heinrich Klaasen, Anmolpreet Singh, Upendra Yadav, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Abhishek Sharma, Marco Jansen, Washington Sundar, Sanvir Singh, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Fazalhaq Farooqi, T Natarajan, Umran Malik, Mayank Markande, Shahbaz Ahmed, Travis Head, Wanindu Hasaranga, Pat Cummins, Jaydev Unadkat, Akash Singh, Jhathavedh Subramanyan

The Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad can be described as a batters’ buddy. The 22-yard strip offers true bounce and players can benefit from playing shots through the line of the ball. Anything over 200 should be a good score and the skipper winning the toss will most likely opt to bowl first. 

The weather in Ahmedabad come Qualifier 1 of IPL 2024 is expected to be clear and sunny. The probability of precipitation stands at 0% with probability of thunderstorms also at 0% according to AccuWeather.

Shreyas Iyer-led KKR and Pat Cummins-led SRH have played each other 26 times in IPL history.

Sunrisers Hyderabad have won the toss and have opted to bat.

Sunrisers Hyderabad: Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Rahul Tripathi, Nitish Reddy, Heinrich Klaasen (wk), Abdul Samad, Shahbaz Ahmed, Pat Cummins (c), Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Vijayakanth Viyaskanth, T Natarajan.

Impact Sub options: Sanvir Singh, Umran Malik, Glenn Phillips, Washington Sundar, Jaydev Unadkat

Kolkata Knight Riders: Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), Sunil Narine, Venkatesh Iyer, Shreyas Iyer (c), Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Ramandeep Singh, Mitchell Starc, Vaibhav Arora, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy.

Impact Sub options: Anukul Roy, Manish Pandey, Nitish Rana, KS Bharat, Sherfaine Rutherford

Mitchell Starc take Travis Head out in just the second ball.

SRH 8/1

Full and wide from Vaibhav and Abhishek falls.

SRH 33/2

Mitchell Starc starts his third over. First ball to Nitish, and He hit a four! But Starc quickly gets back at Nitish with a short ball and takes outshines him as Gurbaz makes an easy catch.

SRH 50/4

After back-to-back wickets for Kolkata Knight Riders, SRH look tensed, Mitchell Starc clinched Nitish Kumar Reddy. KKR is completely dominating the game so far and explosive batter Heinrich Klaasen is on the crease.

SRH 62/4

Heinrich Klaasen and Rahul Tripathi are keeping KKR on toes. Developing their partnership and looking to save SRH innings. Hitting Sixes and Fours.

SRH 92/4 in 10 Overs

Sunrisers Hyderabad slowly in control of their innings as Rahul Tripathi hits his half-century.

SRH 110/5

SRH continues to take on Narine. Samad takes it in his hand as Rahul Tripathi faces a run out before slamming it over the mid wicket fence for another six. 

SRH 125/7

Harshit Rana with his third over of the day. Throws a dot ball against Samad to start with. Harshit ticks Samad with a slower ball. Craving an easy catch for captain Shreyas Iyer at long off.

SRH 125/8

Another appeal for lbw and this time it's in line of the stumps. The ball-tracking shows the impact was in front of the middle stump and it would have gone on to clip the leg bail - umpire's call there, which was out. Bhuvneshwar walks out.

SRH down to its last wicket. It all comes down to skipper Cummins, who is on strike against Harshit Rana. The KKR pacers gets the best of Cummins twice, with slower balls. Strike end changes, Viyaskanth gives the strike back to his skipper with a single.

SRH 142/9 in 18 overs

SRH are all out for 159. A length ball, Cummins looks to smash it down the ground but gets a top edge. Gurbaz comes forward a couple of steps and pouches it.

Bhuvneshwar Kumar bowl the first over. Gurbaz on strike. At a length on off stump, Gurbaz steps out and defends. Driven through covers, Gurbaz off the mark in style. Hits a four.

KKR 44/0

Thangarasu Natarajan steps in for the first time.

SRH bowlers finally got a wicket as he dismissed KKR opener Gurbaz. KKR is still ahead in this game and Venkatesh Iyer is the new batter on the crease. 

KKR 63/1

Venky Iyer on the charge! Venkatesh Iyer goes down on his knee and and hit a big clean six.

KKR 97/2

In 10.2, Iyer smashes a big six and adds it up to KKR's pocket.

KKR 123/2

Kolkata Knight Riders book a comfortable place in the final with a convincing 8-wicket win. A tossed up delivery and Shreyas Iyer launches it over long-on to draw curtains to the game. The players are quick to exchange handshakes.

 Try to put this day behind quickly. You have these days in T20 cricket, when it doesn't work out. We had few starts but didn't go on with bat. Not good with the ball. Sunny played the last game, we were hoping not to use the batting sub to use Umran but felt the batting was important. (Was there an instinct this would go bad) Thought KKR bowled well and the wicket got better. 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.

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.

KKR will face the other finalist on May 26 at MA Chidambaram Stadium.

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. 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.

Royal Challengers Bengaluru will take on Rajasthan Royals at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on May 22 in the first and only eliminator of the season. The winner of this clash will earn a chance to play in the IPL 2024 final in Qualifier 2.

The winner of the Eliminator clash (RCB vs RR) and the loser of Qualifier 1 SRH will meet at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Cheapuk for a place in the IPL 2024 final.

KKR marches into the final. Good night, check back for more updates.