GUWAHATI, India, March 27, 2025: South Africa’s Quinton de Kock scored an unbeaten 97 as Kolkata Knight Riders secured their first win of the IPL season with an eight-wicket victory over Rajasthan Royals on Wednesday.
Spinners Moeen Ali and Varun Chakravarthy played key roles in limiting Rajasthan to 151-9 after KKR chose to bowl first in Guwahati.
De Kock dominated the chase, hitting 97 off 61 balls with eight fours and six sixes, guiding Kolkata to their target with 15 balls to spare. Despite having retired from Tests and ODIs for South Africa and uncertainty over his T20 future, De Kock showed no signs of rust.
“To be fair, I haven’t felt any challenges yet,” said De Kock. “I’ve had three months off, which felt nice. I had about a 10-day build-up to this season. This is only my second game here, just taking it as I see it.”
Kolkata signed De Kock in November’s auction after he was released by Lucknow Super Giants. He provided a quick start with two boundaries before Moeen was run out for five. Skipper Ajinkya Rahane was dismissed for 18, but De Kock, alongside impact substitute Angkrish Raghuvanshi (22), guided Kolkata to victory with an unbroken stand of 83.
De Kock sealed the win with a six off Jofra Archer as Kolkata bounced back from their opening loss to Royal Challengers Bengaluru. Rajasthan suffered their second consecutive defeat.
Earlier, Kolkata's fast bowler Vaibhav Arora dismissed Sanju Samson for 13, and Chakravarthy and Moeen each took two wickets. Rajasthan's regular captain, Samson, was restricted to batting due to injury. Chakravarthy dismissed stand-in skipper Riyan Parag for 25, and Moeen removed Yashasvi Jaiswal for 29. The pair’s efforts left Rajasthan at 82-5 in 11 overs, and despite Dhruv Jurel’s 33 and 16 from Archer, Rajasthan fell short with a below-par total.
“I think 170 was a reasonable score but we fell short by 20 runs,” said Parag. “The plan was to get Quinny out early, but he didn’t, so we shifted to containing them in the middle overs.”
Arora and quick Harshit Rana also took two wickets each.
Kolkata, led by Shreyas Iyer (now with Punjab Kings after a $3.17 million move in the auction), won their third IPL title last year.