Singh smashes five sixes off last five balls to win epic IPL clash

KKR needed 29 to win off the final over of the match in Ahmedabad to chase down Gujarat’s 204-4. Indian seamer Yash Dayal just had to get two deliveries in the right spot in order to win the game for his IPL franchise.

He started off well when Umesh Yadav could only get a single off the first ball. But that brought Singh onto strike and the near impossible happened.

The uncapped Indian hit the next ball over long off for six. He backed it up with two more to send the crowd into raptures and give them belief of pulling off an incredible win.

KKR needed 10 off two deliveries as Dayal attempted to compose himself. But Singh was in hitting mode and hit a half-tracker over long-on before finishing the game in style into the same area on the final ball of the match as KKR ran out winners by three wickets.

According to Opta Jeev, Singh’s tally of 30 runs is the most ever by a batter in the history of the IPL in a run chase. Only Ravi Jadeja has ever hit five sixes before in the final over of an IPL game.

Singh was unsurprisingly named player of the match and claimed he always believed he could win the game for his team. He said: “I had belief that I can do this. Rana bhai said to keep belief and to bat till the end, then we will see what happens. I was just trying to hit sixes.

“(Umesh) Bhaiya was asking me not to think much and just play the ball. I was not thinking a lot, was just reacting to the ball. It kept coming out of the middle, I had belief and it came off in the end.”

Venkatesh Iyer had earlier hit 83 for KKR and he was thankful for Singh’s brilliance after the match. Iyer said: “It was a nailbiting finish and I’m extremely happy with the way we won the game. We saw in the last game only a few players got double figures but still we ended up scoring 200.

“Tonight’s game was another example that our team will never give up and we can score 200 on any given day. Honestly, the wicket was quite nice to bat [on].

“The ball was coming quite nicely onto the bat and I was just trying to execute my plan. Obviously, when the target is 200 you can’t have silent overs, you need boundaries and the momentum to go your way.

“Me and Nitish Rana had a nice little partnership and that set the tone. Unfortunately we lost the way towards the end but Lord Rinku saved us again.”

Rashid Khan is the skipper of Gujarat and thought he had all but won the game when he bowled a hat-trick earlier in the innings to restrict KKR to 155-7. The Afghanistan star paid tribute to Singh when speaking afterwards.

Khan said: “A tough game for us, especially as a captain. That is what T20 is all about, it is about entertainment.

“Same things happened with us last year when we were on the winning side. A good game of cricket and hopefully the fans would have liked it.

“Rinku played some unbelievable shots. [Dayal] tried his best deliveries but it did not work. Credit goes to the batter the way he finished.”