They are amazing spinners: Moeen Ali lauds Sunil Narine, Varun Chakravarthy after IPL 2025 fixture against CSK

CHENNAI: Following a magnificent bowling performance against the Chennai Super Kings (CSK) in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 on Friday, the Kolkata Knight Riders’ (KKR) right-arm off-spinner Moeen Ali hailed Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy after their marvellous performance in the 25th fixture of the cash-rich league.

Narine was the pick of the bowlers for the Kolkata-based franchise in the game, where he snapped three wickets and conceded just 13 runs in his spell of four overs. He shined with the bat, too, where he slammed 44 runs from 18 balls, which was laced with five maximums and two boundaries in his innings. The 36-year-old was awarded the Player of the Match following his all-round performance.

On the other hand, Chakravarthy bagged two wickets in his four overs, where he gave away 22 runs in the match. He conceded runs at an economy of 5.5 and took the wickets of Vijay Shankar and Deepak Hooda in his spell.

“It was nice, and having two left-handers helped my case. Just trying to keep it as tight as I can and pick up a couple of wickets. Tonight, I picked up one. It is nice, and Rinku’s dive for me to stop that four was big for my confidence. Try not to bowl too quickly; just give time to spin, and sometimes it skids, sometimes it spins. I like to keep the shape of the ball and try to spin it. They (Narine and Varun) are amazing spinners, and they have been for a while now, especially Sunil. If I can bowl a couple of overs up top and set them up in the middle where they are quite hard to hit, I am learning from them and trying to keep up. It [the pitch] was a little bit tacky; you don’t need to spin every ball, just one to put the doubt in the batter’s mind,” Moeen Ali said in the post-match presentation.

Moeen Ali had a good day out with the ball, where he grabbed one wicket in his spell of four overs, where he gave away 20 runs at an economy of 5. He bowled one maiden over and took the wickets of Devon Conway in his spell.

Recapping the match, Sunil Narine’s match-winning all-round performance helped the Knight Riders return to winning ways with a commanding eight-wicket victory over the Super Kings in the Indian Premier League (IPL) at Chepauk.
KKR chased down the target in just 10.1 overs. They ended at 107/2, not only sealing their third win of the season but also significantly boosting their Net Run Rate. With this victory, KKR climbed to the third spot on the points table with three wins in six games.CSK’s campaign continues to falter, as they suffered their fifth consecutive loss and remain in the ninth position in the standings. (ANI)