Sikandar Raza slammed his maiden IPL fifty after an impressive show by his side's bowling unit as Punjab Kings beat Lucknow Super Giants by two wickets in a last-over finish here on Saturday.
Invited to bat, captain KL Rahul smashed his first fifty of this IPL season but Punjab Kings roared back with timely wickets to restrict the Lucknow side to a modest 159 for eight.
Chasing 160 for a win, Zimbabwean Raza, who also picked a wicket with his spin bowling, cracked a 41-ball 57 to keep PBKS in the hunt after Matthew Short's 22-ball 34.
SRK does it for PBKS again
Once he was holed out in the 18th over off Ravi Bishnoi, Shahrukh Khan (23 not out) completed the job, knocking off the final runs with a boundary.
Raza hit four boundaries and three sixes in his match-winning knock.
On a two-paced wicket, KL Rahul displayed great composure en route his 56-ball 74 as he added 53 and 48 runs with Kyle Mayers (29) and Krunal Pandya (18) for the first and third wickets respectively.
However, LSG couldn't finish things with a flourish as they lost four wickets for 48 runs in the last five overs, with Sam Curran picking up three of those.
All-round Sikandar Raza show in Lucknow
Kagiso Rabada (2/34), Arshdeep Singh (1/22), Harpreet Brar (1/10) and Sikandar Raza (1/19) were also among wickets.
Defending the total, pacer Yudhvir Singh made a sensational debut, dismissing fellow debutant Atharva Taide (0) and Prabhsimran Singh (4) -- who replaced Rahul Chahar as impact sub -- in his first two overs to reduce PBKS to 17 for 2.
Matthew Short looked in good nick, slamming three boundaries off Avesh Khan, before producing two hits to the fence off Yudhvir.
Krishnappa Gowtham, who replaced Kyle Mayers as impact sub, too, was smacked for a six by Short but the spinner had the batter caught by Stoinis as Punjab slumped to 45 for 3 in 6 overs.
Raza then took the onus on himself as he and Harpreet Singh Bhatia (22) added run-a-ball 30 before Pandya broke the stand, holing out the former at deep backward square.
Raza exploded in the 13th over, clobbering two successive sixes and a four off Pandya to pile up 17 runs.
However, KL Rahul produced a sensational effort to get rid off Jitesh Sharma, while Ravi Bishnoi, introduced after 14 overs, got rid off Curran (6) before accounting for Raza to raise hopes of an upset.
Needing 21 in 13 balls, Shahrukh sent Woods sailing for a maximum, while Brar too picked up a four to bring down the required runs.
Earlier, Rahul and Mayers provided LSG a flying start with the burly left-handed West Indian being the aggressor initially.
While Rahul dealt in boundaries, Mayers dealt in maximums.
