Chennai Super Kings got a taste of its own medicine as Trinidad & Tobago's assortment of slow and medium bowlers consigned the local side to a 12-run defeat, its second in three matches, and pushed it to the brink of elimination in the Champions League T20 at the M.A. Chidambaram Stadium on Sunday.
Sunil Narine (three for eight off four overs), in the company of Kevin Cooper (one for 15 off four) and Samuel Badree (none for 15 off four), strangled Chennai's chase of T&T's 123, reducing the late show of Dwayne Bravo (32 not out, 22b, 5x4) and Albie Morkel (18 not out, 12b, 2x6) to an exercise in shoring up the side's net run rate.
The scenarios
If T&T loses its remaining fixture against Cape Cobras, the defending champion will find itself out of the tournament, while a loss for the South African side will still need Super Kings to beat New South Wales Blues convincingly to qualify.
Super Kings' batting, which has looked a little suspect all tournament, crumbled on a wicket that was slow, but not impossible to bat on.
Barring Bravo, nobody looked comfortable. M.S. Dhoni scratched around for seven off 22 balls; S. Badrinath did only a little better, taking 26 balls to get to 14, as the chase never took off against some sustained and accurate slow bowling.
Added significance
Narine's figures assume added significance as he bowled half his overs during the Power Play. The wickets he picked up were that of Murali Vijay (out bowled) playing across, Suresh Raina and Dhoni (both out caught and bowled) — any one of whom could have taken the match away.
The home team retained its line-up, passing up on the opportunity to add an extra spinner (or a pure batsman) to its ranks in the place of Wriddhiman Saha, a change that would have been understandable looking at how the low-scoring Mumbai Indians-New South Wales Blues match that was played on the same sluggish wicket panned out earlier.
Perhaps, how MI and NSW Blues set out in the early start (eight wickets went down across the two Power Plays) had some lessons for T&T. The West Indian side elected to keep its line intact against Doug Bollinger (three for 30) and Albie Morkel, inching to 28 at the end of the Power Play and 34 after eight overs.
The flip side of such a strategy, especially in the 20-over format, is that the side that is off to a circumspect start finds itself in a hole when wickets go down in a hurry, as the visitors were to discover.
Perking it up
William Perkins (34, 28b, 2x4, 2x6) was the first to break out, smacking the Super Kings spinners for two sixes before cutting Shadab Jakati (two for 18) straight to Badrinath in the 10th over. Lendl Simmons (20, 33b, 1x4) was run out in the next over and when Darren Bravo chipped Jakati straight back, T&T had lost three wickets for five runs in 14 balls.
The Caribbean side went boundary-less for a stretch of almost six overs when the home team's spinners were in operation, and wickets continued to tumble too.
On the balance of things, however, the discreet start did prove a success as it left T&T with enough hitters at the deep end.
Adrian Barath (23, 22b, 2x4) and Kevin Cooper (28, 10b, 1x4, 3x6) slogged to good effect, taking T&T to 123, a total that proved too much for Super Kings.
The scores:
Trinidad & Tobago: L. Simmons (run out) 20 (33b, 1x4) , W. Perkins c Badrinath b Jakati 34 (28b, 2x4, 2x6) , Darren Bravo c & b Jakati 1 (6b) , A. Barath b Bollinger 23 (22b, 2x4) , D. Ganga c Raina b Ashwin 8 (10b) , D. Ramdin lbw b Dwayne Bravo 3 (4b) , K. Cooper c Dwayne Bravo b Bollinger 28 (10b, 1x4, 3x6) , S. Ganga b Bollinger 3 (6b) , R. Rampaul (not out) 1 (1b) ; Extras (lb-1, w-1): 2; Total (for eight wkts. in 20 overs): 123.
Fall of wickets: 1-52, 2-55, 3-57, 4-72, 5-90, 6-92, 7-110, 8-123.
Chennai Super Kings bowling: Morkel 4-0-24-0, Bollinger 4-0-30-3, Dwayne Bravo 4-0-25-1, Jakati 4-0-18-2, Ashwin 4-0-25-1.
Chennai Super Kings: M. Hussey c Ramdin b Rampaul 13 (12b, 2x4) , M. Vijay b Narine 6 (8b, 1x4) , S. Raina c & b Narine 2 (8b) , S. Badrinath (run out) 14 (26b, 1x4) , W. Saha lbw b Cooper 8 (11b) , M.S. Dhoni c & b Narine 7 (22b) , Dwayne Bravo (not out) 32 (22b, 5x4) , A. Morkel (not out) 18 (12b, 2x6) ; Extras (lb-6, w-4, nb-1): 11; Total (for six wkts. in 20 overs): 111.
Fall of wickets: 1-21, 2-25, 3-27, 4-48, 5-52, 6-75.
Trinidad & Tobago bowling: Badree 4-0-14-0, Rampaul 4-0-35-1, Narine 4-0-8-3, S. Ganga 4-0-33-0, Cooper 4-0-15-1.
