India’s Ravichandran Ashwin led Dindigul Dragons to their first-ever Tamil Nadu Premier League (TNPL) championship on Sunday, defeating Lyca Kovai Kings by six wickets thanks to a captain’s knock from the star batsman.
In the final match against the reigning champions Lyca Kovai Kings, Ashwin scored 52 off of 46 balls, and the Dindigul Dragons successfully chased 130.
Ashwin smashed a four and three sixes while forming a 65-run third-wicket stand with Baba Indrajith (32 off 35 balls).
After scoring 46 runs for the loss of two wickets in the powerplay, Dindigul’s middle-order depended on the composed Ashwin to finish the job with 10 deliveries remaining.
Lyca’s Gowtham Thamarai Kannan, Manimaran Siddharth, Valliappan Yudheeswaran, and Shahrukh each took one wicket.
Dindigul had previously kept the Lyca batsmen on the back foot by taking wickets at regular intervals. After deciding to field, Sandeep Warrier (11 off 9 balls) made his first breakthrough by removing Suresh Kumar in the third over.
Dindigul’s momentum shifted significantly in the sixth over, as Varun Chakravarthy struck twice, followed by P Vignesh removing Sai Sudharsan (14 off 14 balls).
Atheeq Ur Rahman (25 off 17 balls) and Ram Arvindh (27 off 26 balls) combined 36 runs for the fifth wicket, but Subodh Bhati dismissed the former, ruining the defending champions’ chances of a comeback.
Vignesh further plagued Lyca, eventually dismissing skipper Shahrukh Khan (3 off 7 balls).
Reeling at 105/6, Arvindh couldn’t hold on and gave Sandeep Warrier a catch before cameos from the tail-enders propelled them to 129/7.
Dindigul’s top scorers were Vignesh (2/15) and Chakravarthy (2/26), while Ashwin finished with 0/13.
