IPL 2017: Kolkata riding high after comfortable win over Sunrisers Hyderabad

Robin Uthapp raises his bat after reaching his half century in the Kolkata Knight Riders' win against Sunrisers Hyderabad. Dibyangshu Sarkar / AFP

Kolkata Knight Riders maintained their encouraging start to the Indian Premier League season with a 17-run win over 2016 champions Sunrisers Hyderabad.

A half-century from Robin Uthappa and tight bowling led Kolkata to victory after they had been put into bat by Hyderabad captain David Warner.

Uthappa (68 off 39 balls) and Manish Pandey (46) stabilised the innings after the departure of captain Gautam Gambhir (15), bowled by Rashid Khan, had left them on 40 for two.

The pair put on 77 runs for the third wicket, but after both had been dismissed, the run flow fell away in the final overs as tight bowling from Bhuvneshwar Kumar (three for 20) limited them to 172 for six, when a bigger total had appeared in the offing.

Hyderabad got off to a solid start in reply as openers Warner (26) and Shikhar Dhawan (23) put on 46 for the first wicket, but both fell, along with Moises Henriques (13), to leave them on 65 for three.

Yuvraj Singh (26) looked to be the biggest threat to Kolkata when he struck two sixes, but he was caught by substitute fielder Rishi Dhawan to give Chris Woakes (2-49) the second of his two wickets.

That killed Hyderabad’s momentum as both Sunil Narine (1-18) and Kuldeep Yadav (1-23) proving hard to score against, and Kolkata cruised to their third victory of the season when they restricted the visitors to 155 for six.

* The National staff

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