CCL 2024: Kerala Strikers stun Telugu Warriors; win by 1 run, after nerve-racking last over

Do or die – that is what this match was for the Kerala Strikers. They had lost both their matches in Sharjah and desperately needed a win to stay in contention in the Celebrity Cricket League. The odds were, no doubt, stacked against them, because they were facing defending champions Telugu Warriors, who’d won both their earlier group stage matches and seemed to be in supreme form. But then, the Strikers managed the unthinkable in a match that went right down to the wire and upstaged the Warriors in front of their home crowd.

The Strikers won the toss and decided to bat first and posted a total of 95 runs in their first 10 overs, to which the Telugu Warriors responded with 112 runs on the score board. Ashwin Babu and Thaman were the top scorers yet again. 17 runs ahead and with a chance to chase down whatever the Strikers post, it seemed that the Warriors were very comfortably placed. Especially after the Strikers ended their second innings score at 93 runs with a total of 77 to chase in 10 overs.

For the formidable side that the Telugu Warriors is, getting 77 should have been a cakewalk. But what transpired at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium is that the Strikers had a chokehold on them. The Warriors’ scoring rate was low, wickets were falling, they’d lost their heavy hitters. It did seem that the Strikers had swung the match their way.

It all came down to the final over, bowled by Alexander Prashant. The Warriors needed 12 runs from 6 balls when Alexander got Sachiin Joshi out in his first ball. In tense matches, wickets and dot balls matter, and here was a combination of both. Raghu who replaced him was sent back to the pavilion in a beauty of a caught and bowled situation off of a full toss, in the very next ball. Alexander was poised for hattrick, but Prince denied him that getting a quick single instead.

But then Alexander offered them 2 extra runs by bowling wide leaving the Warriors with 8 runs from 3 balls. And Adarsh decided to rub salt into that wound by hitting the next ball for a massive 6. It was now 2 of 2. Alexander bowls again, a dot ball that Adarsh thinks should have been called wide. Down to the last ball, and still 2 needed for a win, the Warriors could at least manage a tie and head into a super over. But the ball, swerves wide, is not called so, which wicket keeper Rajeev collects and runs out the batsman and achieving what no one thought was possible at the start of this match – a win for the Kerala Strikers.