Knights fight hard yet fall short of a win | DC vs ADKR | ADKR 2024
The Knights clashed against the Dubai Capitals at the iconic Dubai International Stadium. The Knights were eager to step onto the field and put out a performance to remember after a tough outing in the last match. Both the teams came into the game winning 1 apiece out of the 2 games played and were hoping to bag an important victory.
The Knights were put into bat on a green top surface which seemed to have help for the bowlers. The openers had a tough start with the bowlers getting a lot of movement from the surface. The Knights lost early wickets and found themselves in a tough situation as DC looked to capitalize. However, Laurie Evans & Sam Hain had other plans, as the duo stitched together a colossal partnership. A 131-run stand between the two Englishmen put the Knights right on track of a big total. Both the seasoned T20 players played quality percentage cricket and punished the bad balls. Evans was the initial aggressor in the partnership while Hain played second fiddle & adjusted to the conditions. Once he got settled, Hain went all guns blazing on the DC bowlers. Hain’s 77 off 49 balls and Evans’ 67 not out off 41 balls, took the Knights to an impressive total of 184 which looked to be an above par total on a sticky two-paced pitch.
While defending the total, the Knights started in aggressive fashion. David Willey got the prized wicket of DC Skipper David Warner on the 2nd ball of the innings as the Knights looked to put the pressure on the board. DC batters came hard at the bowlers with pitch getting better to bat as the game progressed but the Knights kept on picking wickets. Russell & Narine were able to pull back the opposition with a couple of wickets, however the calculated partnership between Raza and Billings proved too good for the ADKR bowlers as ADKR faced a defeat by 5 wickets after a hard-fought game. The Knights will now be looking to regroup, pick out the positives from the game and comeback harder in the next game.