![\"Finn](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/4JOWTFV_AFP__20260508__B2B393G__v1__HighRes__CricketIndIplT20DelhiKolkata_jpg.jpeg\")
<\/p>\n<\/p>\n
\nFinn Allen celebrates scoring a century for the Kolkata Knight Riders.
\nPhoto: AFP\n<\/p>\n
Kolkata Knight Riders opener Finn Allen has smashed an unbeaten 100 off just 47 balls in their eight-wicket demolition of Delhi Capitals in a timely boost to their playoff hopes in the Indian Premier League (IPL).<\/p>\n
Allen smashed 10 sixes in his scintillating knock, as Kolkata chased down a 143-run target with 5.4 overs to spare for their fourth win on the trot to move up to seventh place in the 10-team league.<\/p>\n
Delhi’s hopes of a top-four finish appear over, as they slumped behind Kolkata, and their captain Axar Patel was already thinking about the next season.<\/p>\n
“We’ll go and figure out where we’ve made mistakes,” Axar said, after the home loss.<\/p>\n
“There’s next year too, we’ll have to think of plans and preparation for next year, and accordingly, think of which players who are currently on the bench should be given chances.”<\/p>\n
Put into bat, Delhi managed a below-par 142\/8, with only Pathum Nissanka (50) and Ashutosh Sharma (39) briefly dominating the bowlers.<\/p>\n
Kolkata applied the squeeze through their three-pronged spin attack, which returned the combined figures of 12-0-76-3.<\/p>\n
Allen toyed with the Delhi attack when Kolkata returned to chase, and the New Zealander was particularly harsh on the spinners.<\/p>\n
With the target in sight, Allen put on a show, hitting Vipraj Nigam for three sixes in a row and smashing a couple of them in the next over from Kuldeep Yadav.<\/p>\n
A six off Mukesh Kumar sealed Allen’s maiden IPL hundred while also securing his team’s victory.<\/p>\n
“I’ve been working on having more strings in my bow,” player of the match Allen said.<\/p>\n
“It was challenging early on, then I went on to bat deep. That’s my model – stay in when it’s tough, give myself a chance. Nice to have success after some frustration.”<\/p>\n
– Reuters<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Finn Allen celebrates scoring a century for the Kolkata Knight Riders. Photo: AFP Kolkata Knight Riders opener Finn…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":419052,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[48,47,111,43,139,69,49,46,44,45,213],"class_list":["post-419051","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-audio","tag-current-affairs","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-podcasts","tag-public-radio","tag-radio-new-zealand","tag-rnz","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419051","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=419051"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/419051\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/419052"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=419051"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=419051"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=419051"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}