A floodlight disruption and a norwester ruled as Chennai Super Kings inched closer to a semi-final berth with a two-run victory over Kolkata Knight Riders via the Duckworth-Lewis method in an Indian Premier League match in Kolkata on Sunday.
Paceman Makhaya Ntini picked up a hat-trick as Knight Riders were reduced to a modest total of 149 for five.
Chennai team were 55 without loss after eight overs, when a sudden burst of wind resulted in some of the bulbs in each of the four light towers conking off at the Eden Gardens.
Play was immediately stopped and the situation turned worse as a norwester with high wind velocity raged accompanied by rains, tossing into the air the tarpaulin sheets, covering the wicket and the outfield.
The Duckworth-Lewis rain rule was called into play and the authorities declared Chennai Super Kings the winner by two runs after waiting in vain for 90 minutes for the situation to improve.
The Knight Riders were 46 for 2 after eight overs, but Chennai needed to make 53 without losing a wicket for a victory.
In the end, a boundary by Stephen Fleming (32 not out, 20b, 6x4) with a fine leg glide on the penultimate delivery off Ajit Agarkar proved crucial for Chennai, who now have 12 points from 11 matches and look well poised to make it to the last four.
A ball earlier, Ashok Dinda had failed to latch on to a catch offered by Parthiv Patel (19 not out, 28 b, 2x4) at long off.
The Knight Riders are now staring down at the wrong end of the barrel, and their hopes of making the cut for the semis look dim.
Earlier, South Africa's Ntini came up with a fine hat-trick to restrict the Kolkata.
The 30-year-old got rid of Knight Riders skipper Sourav Ganguly with the last ball of his third over, before he was taken off the attack by Stephen Fleming, standing-in for MS Dhoni who retired with an injured finger.
Ntini came back in the 17th over and immediately struck a double blow, by showing the door to Debabrata Das (27) and David Hussey (0) with his first two balls, to complete the third hat-trick of the tourney after pacer L Balaji and leg spinner Amit Mishra.
He finished with impressive figures of 4-0-21-4.
For the Knight Riders, Pakistani left hander Salman Butt (73; 84b, 10x4, 1x6) deftly anchored the innings after the hosts lost two early wickets and steadied the ship by putting on 86 runs for the third wicket alongside the young Debabrata Das.
