Heinrich Klaasen scored just nine runs before Sam Curran caught him off Harshal Patel’s bowling.
But if his bat didn’t roar for once, then his wicketkeeping gloves certainly did the talking in the Sunrisers Hyderabad’s Indian Premier League (IPL) match against the Punjab Kings.
The South African sent Shikhar Dhawan back to the dressing room after he stumped the Kings opener off Bhuvneshwar Kumar’s bowling.
The delivery was measured at 140 km/h.
Dhawan moved two steps out of his batting camp to drive Kumar through the cover field. However, the ball flashed past his batting edge and Klaasen – who served against the wickets – knocked off the crossbars with one whipping movement.
That wicket meant that the Kings staggered with their score at 20/3, but Shashank Singh and Ashutosh Sharma’s unbeaten partnership of 66 runs (from just 27 deliveries) for the seventh wicket almost pulled the wagon through the drift.
The two batsmen hit a couple of sixes in the final over of the match, but the Sunrisers still won the showdown by two runs.
Aiden Markram was taken out for a wicket in the Sunrisers innings.
- Summary of the scorecard:
Sunrisers Hyderabad 182/9 in 20 overs: Nitish Reddy 64, Arshdeep Singh 4/29 and Harshal Patel 2/30.
Punjab Kings 180/6 in 20 overs: Shashank Singh 46*, Ashutosh Sharma 33* and Bhuvneshwar Kumar 2/32.
Outcome: Sunrisers win by two runs.
