Chennai Super Kings (CSK), easily the most-favoured team (backed by the majority of cricket-loving fans in the country) to lift the coveted Indian Premier League (IPL) 2018 T20 cricket trophy, put a firm step towards the objective when it won the Qualifier-1 on Tuesday night in Mumbai against Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) by scripting a memorable 2-wicket victory after miraculously recovering from a position of no return.

CSK thus entered the final of the IPL, 2018 to be played in Mumbai in five days from now i.e. on the night of Sunday, the 27th May. This is the seventh time that CSK has entered the final of the tournament which is in its 11th year (remember, CSK didn’t play the 2016 and 2017 editions of the tournament). In some ways, it has made its 7th final in nine attempts, which itself is an admirable feat.

CSK made the finals in the inaugural IPL in 2009, won the trophy in consecutive years in 2010 and 2011 and lost the finals in the next consecutive years i.e. in 2012 an 2013. It again lost the finals to Mumbai Indians in 2015. For a team which had easily chased totals in excess of 180 with relative ease in the past on many occasion, a seemingly below-par score of 139 looked like a mountain to climb when it lost its 8th wicket (Harbhajan Singh) in the penultimate ball of the 18th over.

What followed in the next eight balls was simply unbelievable, something which is cooked up only in Mumbai’s Bollywood film scripts. CSK made an astonishing 27 runs off the next ball and won the nail-baiter comfortably with five balls to spare when Faf du Plessis lifted the first ball of the 20th over (bowled by the ever-dependable Bhuvi) nonchalantly over the long-off fence to trigger off celebrations in CSK’s dug-out.

The unbeaten 9th wicket pair of Faf and Shardul Thakur (who made 15 off just 5 balls with three boundaries, the third boundary being a straight-driven lofted four off Siddharth Kaul) yielded the winning runs. Faf, who opened the innings with Shane Watson and who saw eight of his partners getting separated, combined well with Shardul and made sure that CSK didn’t need to travel all the way to Kolkata to play the winner of tomorrow’s ‘Eliminator’ (between KKR and RR) on Friday to find a way to reach the finals.

Faf du Plessis, who is the Test and ODI captain of South Africa, hasn’t justified his place in the star-studded CSK which has star-cricketers in M.S. Dhoni, Harbhajan Singh, Shane Watson, Ambati Rayudu, Suresh Raina, Ravindra Jadeja, Dwayne Bravo and Lungi Ngidi. On a sluggish wicket at the Wankhede, howver, du Plessis found his touch and weathered the period of spinning overs bowled by Rashid Khan and Shakib Al Hasan before launching his on-slaught in the ‘death overs’ on pacers Brathwaite, Kaul and Bhuvaneshwar Kumar.

Earlier, CSK won the toss and put SRH to bat. It tasted immediate success when Deepak Chahar disturbed in-form Shikhar Dhawan’s stumps off the very first ball of the match. Run rate was healthy but SRH was reduced to 50/4 by the end of seven overs. It was only some late assault by all-rounder Carlos Brathwaite that helped SRH reach a position of strength (not a winning total by any standard) as it made 139/7 in 20 overs, plundering 51 runs in the last 5 overs.

CSK started badly but Raina counter-attacked nicely for his 13-ball 22 with four hits to the fence. His departure and the first-ball duck of in-form Ambati Rayudu in the fourth over reduced CSK to 24/3 inside four overs. Its problems compounded when Dhoni made an error in judgment and got out for an uncharacteristic 18-ball 9. Wickets kept tumbling at one end even as Faf held forte firmly at one end to help CSK stitch together an unbroken ninth wicket partnership of 26 runs in 1.2 overs. It was indeed clinical exhibition of what CSK could to at crunch situations to wriggle itself out of those situations!

Man of the Match: Faf du Plessis (for 67* off just 42 balls with five 4’s and four 6’s.

Brief score: SRH 139/7 in 20 overs (Williamson 24, Shakib 12, Yusuf Pathan 24, Brathwaite 43*, Bravo 2/25 lost to CSK 140/8 in 19.1 overs (du Plessis 62*, Raina 22, Shardul Thakur 15*, Rashid Khan 2-11)