Lucknow Super Giants vs Chennai Super Kings, 34th Match - Live Cricket Score, Commentary

LSG needed a win and they have got one. Big one actually. They had lost two on the bounce. Their next assignment after this was at Chepauk. They needed a win at any cost and they have pocketed it easily. They were geared up for a big tussle but CSK batters just couldn't arrive today. Jadeja and MSD towards the end ensured it was close to 180. Else for a major part of the first innings, CSK were behind the 8-ball. Then QDK and Rahul just came up with a clinical response. Two points have allowed LSG to occupy the fifth position on the table. Their NRR is in positive as well. A herd of four teams were looking to breakaway but LSG wants to be part of the traffic. CSK would feel a little disappointed as they came into this game having defended a score at Wankhede. But three home games from now is just the tonic that the team in yellow won't complain of. We aren't complaining either as we move rapidly towards the half stage in the tourney. Teams are closely packed to each other. And we will continue dishing out every detail. This is our team of MS Ramakrishnan, Abhinand Raghavendran, Siva and Kumar Abhisekh Das signing off.

KL Rahul, skipper of LSG and Player of the Match: Feels good at the end of the day. When you win, most decisions feel right. We were committed to our plans. Really happy with that. Depends on the wicket, I deploy my bowlers. We tried to mix it around. The bowlers executed really well. The team is sticking to the plans. Halfway stage, I would have been happy with 160. The wicket was slow and a bit of grip. MSD walked in and the pressure got to the bowlers. He has had the intimidation on opposition bowlers. Our young bowlers were put under pressure with the crowd going berserk as well. 15-20 runs extra they got. I have been trying to assess the situation. It came off today. I knew the CSK spinners will put the pressure on. I picked my bowlers and it came off. Quinton batted well as well. Made life easy for both. Different ball game playing in Chennai. Was playing in front of mini Chennai crowd. We are a young team and happy to play in front of such a crowd.

Marcus Stoinis: We did need that, it was an very important win for us. We've got these guys - Chennai - in a couple of days' time, it's important two games for us, it's nice to be back on the winning board. We are playing good cricket. With how we started with the ball and taking early wickets, I think we could have kept them under that total. Hats off to the way they played and they finished obviously with MS. They played well towards the end but it's a nice wicket and we built some partnerships. Quinny (de Kock) and KL batted beautifully to pretty much seal it and then Nicky (Pooran) came in and iced the cake. That's an important partnership for us at the top. Having that continuity, having?them get us off to a start allows us to play the rest of the innings and to build an order around it as well. We've got that confidence with our team and the nice thing about this season so far is there's been different boys stepping up and chipping in to win these games at different stages. We've had our bowling attack bowl well, we've had our batters bat well, had our opening partnership tonight. Different people are putting their hand up which I think is a great sign for the team. I said to KL if I was done for the next four games or are you going to give me the ball again. I wanna bowl, if you can get into the captain's ear and just push that, it'll be great.

Ruturaj Gaikwad: We finished well with the bat, couldn't have asked more with the situation we were in. After powerplay we couldn't capitalize on the start we got and we kept losing wickets at regular intervals. I would say we were 10-15 runs short. Slightly difficult with such a total, with the impact sub rule you need 10-15 or even 20 runs extra. Pitches like these seem sluggish to start off with but with dew coming on it gets better, 190 would have been a good score. One area we would like to improve in taking wickets in the powerplay. That will put pressure on the opposition. We need to work on it. Good to play them again (next game at Chepauk). We will come up with good homework done now that we have three home games.

Stats by Roshan Gede

Successful run-chases in Lucknow in the IPL (by targets)
177 - LSG vs CSK, 2024
168 - DC vs LSG, 2024
160 - PBKS vs LSG, 2023
122 - LSG vs SRH, 2023

KL Rahul in run-chases vs CSK
Innings: 7
Runs: 371
Avg: 61.83
SR: 161.3
50s: 4
HS: 98*

Most 50-plus scores as a designated wicketkeeper (IPL)
25 - KL Rahul
24 - MS Dhoni
23 - Quinton de Kock
21 - Dinesh Karthik
18 - Robin Uthappa

Opening stands vs CSK in IPL 2024
41(4.3 overs) - RCB, Chennai
28 (2.5 overs) - GT, Chennai
93(9.3 overs) - DC, Visakhapatnam
46 (2.4 overs) - SRH, Hyderabad
0 (0.1 overs) - KKR, Chennai
70 (7.1 overs) - MI, Mumbai
134 (15 overs) - LSG, Lucknow
Total: 412 runs (Average: 58.85, RR: 9.84)
Opening partnerships have collectively averaged 58.85 vs CSK this season, which is the most against a team, followed by 57.57 vs RCB.

Highest opening partnerships vs CSK in the IPL
144 - Ajinkya Rahane & Shane Watson (RR), Ahmedabad, 2015
138 - Shikhar Dhawan & Prithvi Shaw (DC), Mumbai WS, 2021
134 - KL Rahul & Quinton de Kock (LSG), Lucknow, 2024
127 - Graeme Smith & Swapnil Asnodkar (RR), Chennai, 2008
116* - Quinton de Kock & Ishan Kishan (MI), Sharjah, 2020
116 - David Warner & Shikhar Dhawan (SRH), Ranchi, 2014

Highest partnerships for LSG (any wicket)
210* - KL Rahul & Quinton de Kock vs KKR, Mumbai DYP, 2022
134 - KL Rahul & Quinton de Kock vs CSK, Lucknow, 2024
99 - KL Rahul & Quinton de Kock vs CSK, Brabourne, 2022
96 - KL Rahul & Deepak Hooda vs RCB, Kolkata, 2022
95 - KL Rahul & Deepak Hooda vs DC, Mumbai WS, 2022

Successful run-chases for LSG in the IPL (by targets)
213 vs RCB - by 1 wicket - Bengaluru, 2023
211 vs CSK - by 6 wickets - Brabourne, 2022
183 vs SRH - by 7 wickets - Hyderabad, 2023
177 vs CSK - by 8 wickets - Lucknow, 2024
150 vs DC - by 6 wickets - Mumbai DYP, 2022
122 vs SRH - by 6 wickets - Lucknow, 2023
This was just their 6th win in 17 matches while batting second in the IPL.

23:18 Local Time, 17:48 GMT, 23:18 IST: LSG haven't lost much sweat in chasing this down. Did it get easier to bat second? It did. But CSK bowling and fielding was a lot to be desired. They sprayed it to all parts of the deck. Didn't use Ali enough and Jadeja the bowler was put under pressure. Mustafizur struggled for control and so did Pathirana. But all of this because Rahul batted like a dream. The wicket was a little two-paced. QDK found it a little tough and got a chance as well. But he hung in there and together with Rahul added 134 for the first wicket. That killed off the chase. Earlier, LSG controlled the CSK batting as well to restrict them to 176. LSG picked up wickets with the new ball and in the middle overs and it was MSD who scored a brisk cameo to take them close to 180. In hindsight, CSK would feel that they were at least 20 short as LSG barely tried too hard to chase this down.

Tushar Deshpande to Pooran, FOUR, sliced over point. LSG win! They win with an over and 8 wickets to spare. They have thumped the visitors here. Was short, Pooran backed away and managed to get it over point

Tushar Deshpande to Pooran, no ball, free-hit coming up! The scores are level. Was a highish full toss, slanted across, Pooran wanted to open the face of the bat but missed it. CSK have reviewed it. Despite Pooran bending down, it was still close to being head high. CSK taking their chance. The height on the ball was 1.23m and the waist height for Pooran is 0.99m. So, it was a no-ball

Tushar Deshpande to Stoinis, 1 run, tucks a length delivery down to deep mid for a single. 2 needed now. Nicky P has the chance

Tushar Deshpande to Stoinis, 2 runs, low full toss, outside off, Stoinis sliced it down to deep third man for a couple of runs. The throw came in at the bowler's end. But easy two scored

Tushar Deshpande to Stoinis, no run, length delivery, angled across, Stoinis looked to slog it and gets an inside edge down to the keeper

Tushar Deshpande to Stoinis, wide, very full, very wide, Stoinis misses it and wided again. Deshpande sticking to his plan but execution has been poor

Tushar Deshpande to Stoinis, wide, fails to nail the wide yorker from round the wicket. The batter tried to jam it but missed. Wided