HYDERABAD: Varun Chakravarthy continued his resurgence with a three-wicket haul while veteran Sunil Narine grabbed his 200th wicket in the Indian Premier League as Sunrisers Hyderabad came back strong in the middle overs to bowl Kolkata Knight Riders out for 165 in 19 overs here on Sunday.
Opting to bat, SRH were in their usual menacing batting form, reaching 77 for 1 after powerplay and 107 for 2 at the halfway mark, courtesy Travis Head's (61 off 28 balls) second consecutive half century. But they collapsed spectacularly in the second half of their innings, as they lost nine wickets in 10 overs for the addition of 60 runs.
This was the first time SRH were bowled out in the IPL 2026.
Chakravarthy returned with 3/26 while Narine took two wickets for 31. Kartik Tyagi chipped in with 2/30.
Head's innings was laced with nine fours and three sixes, and he was well supported by Ishan Kishan (42 off 29 balls). This was the third successive match SRH had scored more than 100 runs inside first 10 overs.
The explosive Australian batter stitched 44 runs in just 3.4 overs with Abhishek Sharma (15 off 10 balls) for the opening wicket and then had an alliance of 61 runs with Kishan for the second wicket.
Head was at his destructive best in the second over bowled by Vaibhav Arora, hitting four boundaries. Head did not let Narine off also, hitting a six and four in the third over. He also punished his Australian team-mate Cameron Green with three fours in the fifth over of the innings.
But once Head was out in the final ball of the ninth over, off the bowling of Chakravarthy, SRH's batting fell apart.
Dangerous Heinrich Klaasen (11) was dismissed, courtesy a spectacular fielding effort from Rovman Powell off the bowling of Green. The West Indian moved to his right at deep midwicket and then leapt to pluck the ball out of thin air with his right hand. In the process, he struck his head on the ground. This was Klaasen's lowest score of the season.
Chakravarthy got rid of Ravichandran Smaran and Aniket Verma in his back-to-back overs to complete his three-wicket haul before veteran West Indies off-spinner Narine removed well-set Kishan in the 16th over for his 200th wicket.
Playing his 197th match, Narine, who also opened KKR's bowling, joined an exclusive three-member club of 200 wicket-takers in the IPL, the other two being Bhuvneshwar Kumar (215 from 199 matches) and Yuzvendra Chahal (228 from 182 matches).