Yusuf Pathan cracked an unbeaten 37 runs off only 18 balls to power Kolkata Knight Riders to a convincing 8-wicket victory over Rising Pune Supergiants in a rail-curtailed game at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Saturday.
KKR were set a 66-run target in nine overs via Duckworth-Lewis method.
Yusuf's blazing knock was laced with three sixes and four boundaries as KKR chased down the target with four overs remaining.
While KKR jumped to second spot in the points table with seven wins from 11 matches, Pune are knocked out of the tournament.
This will also be the first instance when MS Dhoni will not be a part of play-offs in the history of IPL.
Defending a modest total spinner Ravichandran Ashwin claimed both KKR openers in the first over of innings. He first got Robin Uthappa stumped by Dhoni and followed it up by trapping Gautam Gambhir in front of the wicket.
But, a blazing counter-attack by Yusuf Pathan proved too much for Pune bowlers as KKR strolled to full points in this crucial game.
Earlier, KKR spinners dominated on a spin-friendly track to reduce Pune to 103/6 in 17.4 overs before rain interrupted their innings.
Piyush Chawla claimed 2/21 and bowled 13 dot balls while Sunil Narine, who returned after two matches, gave away a miserly 10 runs from 3.4 overs as Pune Supergiants struggled to break free.
Dhoni was in the midst of Pune's terrible struggle as he crawled to eight runs from 22 balls.
Pune were however looking good at 70/3 and when Dhoni walked in they were 74/4 in 10.3 overs but by the time the rain interrupted the proceedings their run-rate had slipped to less than six.
Opting to bat on a turning surface, Pune failed to get going at the top with Russell giving the first breakthrough in the third over.
Trying to hit across the line, Rahane (two) played on a wide delivery as Russell gave KKR a perfect start bowling in tandem with More Morkel for four overs.
Aussie duo of Usman Khawaja and George Bailey perished to spinners after Gambhir introduced Shakib in the fifth over.
Khawaja (21 from 17 balls; 3x4) was playing freely but the Bangladeshi leftarm spinner dismissed the Aussie in his first over when the lefthander smacked straight to Suryakumar Yadav at square-leg.
The pitch started turning and there was all-spin attack from both ends with Chawla introduced in the 11th over. The legspinner brilliantly stumped Bailey (33 from 27 balls; 3x4, 1x6).
In between rookie medium pacer Ankit Rajpoot, playing his first match this season, removed Saurabh Tiwary as Dhoni promoted Irfan Pathan at No 5 to step up their run-rate.
But the Knights spin trio reveled in the conditions.
An interesting Gambhir versus Dhoni battle came to fore when the KKR skipper brought on two slips, a short leg and silly point against the Indian captain and added a fifth fielder at short cover with Chawla bowling a tidy spell.
With Dhoni taking a cautious route, Gambhir was quick to introduce Narine in the next over and the Trinidadian was tidy , giving away just four runs.
Dhoni struggled to keep the flow and to add to his misery his batting partner Irfan was no match to his running.
As it turned out, Pathan became the victim of a runout when he sacrificed his wicket for Dhoni with utter confusion taking place between the two.
Earlier both teams made two changes with Dhoni giving Irfan his second match of the season while a fit-again Murugan Ashwin also returned after two matches, replacing Rajat Bhatia and RP Singh.
A fit-again Narine, who was nursing a finger injury, was back for KKR after two matches replacing Brad Hogg while Rajpoot replaced Umesh Yadav.
