Newly-wed Josh Inglis jetted off to the IPL to honour his commitments with Lucknow -- and how grateful the Super Giants must have been that their Aussie international put his honeymoon on the back burner to deliver one of the innings of the season for them.
Alas, though, for the IPL's bottom club Lucknow, Chennai Super Kings unleashed their own record-breaking champion on Sunday as Urvil Patel hit the joint-fastest half-century in the league's history off just 13 balls before they earned a last-over victory by five wickets.
In just his second game of the campaign, Inglis was mesmerising, blasting 10 fours and six sixes, scattered at 360 degrees all around the Chepauk Stadium complete with a bewildering variety of scoops, ramps and authentic savagery.
It was his first half-century for the Justin Langer-coached outfit and came off only 17 balls, quite eclipsing his fellow opener, national skipper Mitch Marsh, who'd fallen for 10.
But once Inglis tried a scoop too far, feathering a touch behind off England pacer Jamie Overton and gone for 85 off 33 balls, there was an anti-climactic feel that he hadn't been the third Australian in the week to ton up after the prodigious efforts of Punjab's Cooper Connolly and Marsh.
Lucknow went on to 8-203, with Overton a match-turner with his 3-36, but when Chennai went to work, their No.3 Urvil delivered what opposition captain Rishabh Pant called a "fantastic and unbelievable innings - like Inglis's", hitting the first 13 balls he received for 166666461.61 and 1.
Urvil eventually fell for 65 off 23, but it still needed another special effort at the death from Shivam Dube, who, after seeing two wides go by, clocked two sixes from the first two deliveries of the final over to earn the 11 needed.
In the day's later match at Raipur, Josh Hazlewood's Royal Challengers Bengaluru eked out the narrowest of two-wicket wins off the final ball to move top of the table and knock five-times champions Mumbai Indians out of contention.
Mumbai posted 7-166, with Hazlewood taking 1-33 to help restrict them after they'd been asked to bowl, but Indians' pace spearhead Jasprit Bumrah kept them in the hunt with a superb penultimate over, conceding just three runs.
Still, Bengaluru, who lost Tim David for a golden duck in their stuttering chase, still managed to chase down the 15 needed in the final over with only three wickets standing, as an unlikely hero proved to be paceman Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who crashed a six over extra-cover off the fourth ball.
Even Krunal Pandya (73 off 46 balls) acknowledged: "The shot Bhuvi played was the shot of the match!"
FASTEST IPL HALF-CENTURIES
13 balls - Yashasvi Jaiswal (Rajasthan) vs Kolkata, Kolkata, 2023
13 balls - Urvil Patel (Chennai) vs Lucknow, Chennai, 2026
14 balls - KL Rahul (Punjab) vs Delhi, Mohali, 2018
14 balls - Pat Cummins (Kolkata) vs Mumbai, Pune, 2022
14 balls - Romario Shepherd (Bengaluru) vs Chennai, Bengaluru, 2025
Australian Associated Press
