Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) pacer Harshit Rana was fined 100 percent of his match fees and also handed a one-match ban by the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI) for breaching the Code of Conduct during the match against Delhi Capitals (DC) in the ongoing Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024.
Rana, 22, has been one of IPL 2024's biggest revelations as he has bagged 11 wickets in the tournament so far and grabbed everyone’s attention. However, he made the headlines not just because of his heroics with the ball.
Earlier this season, he gave a flying kiss to Sunrisers Hyderabad’s Mayank Agarwal after dismissing him and he was handed a heavy fine by the BCCI. Not much after, Rana repeated the same mistake during the against DC after removing Abhishek Porel in the seventh over.
Porel had smashed Rana for two fours and a six on three consecutive balls but the latter had the last laugh as he removed his opponent and celebrated by showing him the way to the dugout but stopped himself from giving a flying kiss.
However, the incident wasn’t ignored by the BCCI as he was slapped with another fine and a match suspension for breaching the IPL Code of Conduct. He became the first player in the ongoing edition to be banned for breaching the code of conduct.
Earlier on Monday, Shreyas Iyer’s side comfortably chased down the 154-run target with Phil Salt top-scoring for the winning side by contributing 68 runs on just 33 balls with the help of seven fours and five sixes. Meanwhile, his opening partner Sunil Narine had a quiet outing as he departed for just 15 runs.
Shreyas and Venkatesh Iyer stayed till the end and cruised their side to victory, their sixth in the tournament as KKR strengthened their position in the IPL points table.
Meanwhile, batting first, the Capitals’ batters were troubled greatly by KKR’s bowling attack as none of their batters managed to play big innings. Skipper Rishabh Pant could only score 27 runs before becoming Varun Chakarvarthy’s victim.
Kuldeep Yadav was the top scorer of DC as he scored 35 runs but couldn’t guide his side to a defendable total.