Aaradhya Yadav shines as Lucknow Falcons beat Kanpur Superstars in last ball thriller 

Kanpur: Lucknow Falcons emerged victorious in a last ball thriller at the Jio UPT20 match as they defeated the Kanpur Superstars by two wickets. Fans were in for a treat at the Green Park Stadium in Kanpur as over 400 runs were scored across both innings. 

Invited to bat first, an astounding display of hard-hitting saw the Kanpur Superstars race through the powerplay, openers Saurabh Dubey (56) and Ansh Yadav (61) wreaked havoc on the Lucknow Falcons’ bowlers to post the highest powerplay score of the Jio UPT20 tournament at 80/0. Although Dubey’s   blitzkrieg ended in the eighth over, having hit a dazzling six fours and four sixes off just 28 balls, Sameer Rizvi (69) took the mantle and joined Ansh Yadav to sustain the onslaught. As the middle overs unfolded, Ansh Yadav reached his half century in 33 balls and Sameer Rizvi achieved the milestone in 24 balls. However, on the back of Sandeep Tomar the final over saw 16 runs to help the Kanpur Superstars with a formidable total of 221/5. 

In response, the Lucknow Falcons flew to a powerplay score of 67/1. Undeterred by the steep target ahead of them, Aanjaneya Suryavanshi and Harsh Tyagi (46) built them a terrific platform. The Lucknow Falcons were at 148/4 at the end of the 14th over.  Aaradhya Yadav took the onus of steering the innings to the finish line, Hardeep Singh chipped in with a cavalier knock of 16 runs in just six balls before he was Vineet Panwar second wicket of the night. With three overs remaining, Lucknow needed 33 runs, Aaradhya Yadav helped extract 14 runs in the 18th over. Vineet Panwar picked up his third and fourth wicket of the night in the 19th, cleaning up Vipraj Nigam (6) and Vikas Singh (5). However, with just a run required off the last ball, Aaradhya Yadav cleared the extra cover boundary to complete his half century and register a thrilling victory for the Lucknow Falcons.  

Brief Scores  

Lucknow Falcons won by 2 wickets 

Kanpur Superstars: 221/5 in 20 overs (Sameer Rizvi – 69 runs in 27 balls, Ansh Yadav – 61 runs in 45 balls, Saurabh Dubey – 56 runs in 28 balls, Kartikeya Jaiswal –3/36, Yash Dayal – 2/28) 

Lucknow Falcons: (Priyam Garg – 54 runs in 27 balls, Aaradhya Yadav – 50 runs in 24 balls, Harsh Tyagi – 46 runs in 31 balls, Aanjaneya Suryavanshi – 39 runs in 15 balls, Vineet Panwar – 4/28, Ansh Yadav – 1/15, Ankur Chauhan – 1/41, Ankit Rajpoot – 1/48)