Kolkata, 20 May (Hindustan). Lucknow Super Giants defeated Kolkata Knight Riders by one run in the 68th match of IPL 2023 played at Eden Gardens. With this win, Lucknow Super Giants has become the third team to reach the playoffs. Kolkata Knight Riders had a target of 177 runs to win, but could only manage 175 runs for 7 wickets in 20 overs.

Chasing the target of 177 runs from Lucknow Super Giants, Kolkata Knight Riders got off to a great start. Both Kolkata openers Jason Roy and Venkatesh Iyer batted brilliantly and added 61 runs for the first wicket. The first blow to the team came in the form of Iyer, who scored 24 runs. After this, captain Nitish Rana was dismissed early after scoring 8 runs and Rahmanullah Gurbaj 10 runs. In the tenth over of the innings, opener Jason Roy also returned to the pavilion on a personal score of 45. While wickets kept falling from one end, Rinku Singh took charge at the other end and scored an unbeaten 67 runs. Rinku hit six, four and six on the last three balls of the 20th over respectively. Despite this, the Kolkata team was left behind by one run. For Lucknow, Ravi Bishnoi and Yash Thakur got two wickets each, while Krunal Pandya and Krishanappa Gautam took one wicket each.

Earlier, batting after losing the toss, scored 176 runs on the board. Nicholas Pooran scored the highest 58 runs for Lucknow Super Giants. He hit 4 fours and 5 sixes in his innings of 30 balls. Apart from this, opener Quinton de Kock contributed 28 runs, Prerak Mankad 26 and Ayush Badoni contributed 25 runs. For Kolkata, Sunil Naraina, Shardul Thakur and Vaibhav Arora got two wickets each, while Harshit Rana and Varun Chakraborty got one wicket each.