IPL 2019, SRH vs KXIP: Hyderabad give perfect farewell to Warner, beat Punjab by 45 runs

By virtue of this win, Sunrisers have consolidated their fourth position in the table with 12 points from 12 games

David Warner signed off his IPL 2019 campaign in style, notching up his eight fifty of the season to help Sunrisers Hyderabad take a step closer towards qualifying for the play-offs with a comfortable 45-run win over Kings XI Punjab here Monday. By virtue of this win, Sunrisers have consolidated their fourth position in the table with 12 points from 12 games, while Kings XI are at 10 points from as many matches. Chasing the imposing total, KL Rahul (79 off 56, 4x4s, 5x6s) made a valiant effort with the bat but lacked support from the other end as Kings XI were restricted to 167 for eight. Gayle departed in the first ball of the third over, brilliantly caught by Manish Pandey off Khaleel Ahmed (3/40) with Kings XI scoreboard reading 11. Thereafter, Rahul and Mayank Agarwal (27 off 18) added 60 off 39 balls to take Kings XI forward. But just when the partnership was looking threatening, Agarwal was holed by Vijay Shankar off Rashid Khan (3/21) in the ninth over. The new man in Nicholas Pooran (21 off 10) played a short breezy knock before Bhuvneshwar Kumar took a beautiful catch at long-leg boundary off Ahmed to sent packing the batsman. Rashid then came to the party and picked up two wickets -- David Miller (11 off 11) and skipper Ravichandran Ashwin -- in consecutive balls in the 13th over to stand in a chance of registering a hat-trick which didn't materialise. From there on, the asking was tall for Rahul and debutant Prabhsimran Singh (16) and the former finally perished in the 19th over after a beautiful knock to shut the doors for Kings XI. Earlier, playing his last match of the season before heading home for World Cup preparations, Warner struck a belligerent 81 off 56 balls with seven fours and two sixes to complete his IPL 2019 campaign with 692 runs, the highest so far in the tournament.