There were leg side strangles, there were golden ducks, there was dead ball or no ball confusion and there was plenty of drama as Chennai Super Kings overcame a spirited Sunrisers Hyderabad challenge to win the IPL 2018 Qualifier 1 by two wickets, chasing 139, and sealed a place in the IPL final for the seventh time here on Tuesday.After restricting SRH to a below par 139, CSK's hopes of sailing past SRH's total dealt with a major blow as Bhuvneshwar Kumar (1/14) dismissed Shane Watso (0 runs off 5 balls) in the first over before Siddarth Kaul's (2/32) twin strike on consecutive deliveries send Suresh Raina (22 runs off 13 balls )and Ambati Raidu (0 runs off 1 ball) , CSK's leading run-getter , in the 4th over.
Then arrived the Rashid Khan (2/11) wrong' un which crashed the timber , sneaking through the gap of M.S Dhoni's(9 run off of 18 balls) bat and pad and left CSK tottering at 39 for 4 in the 8th over. At that stage ,CSK would have hoped for a Dwayne Bravo (7 runs off 11 balls ) special. But Afghan sensation cut short those plans as he removed the West Indian in 12th over after Shikar dhawan took an easy catch in the slips. Ravindra Jadeja (3 runs off 5 balls) was the next man to get out off sandeep sharma's (2/30) bowling in the 13 th over.
Faf du Plessis (67* runs off 42 balls) started to swing his bat as he and Deepak Chahar (10 runs off 6 balls) added 30 runs off 15 balls before Carlos Brathwaite took a low catch to end Chahar's stay.
SRH would have sealed the game on the 91st ball of CSK's chase but a review saved FAf and kept CSK alive. But CSK the lost Harbhajan Singh( 2 rubs off 9 balls ) as Rashid's brilliance in the out field caught Bhajji short of his crase in the 18th over. But that over cost SRH 20 runs, with Faf hammering 19 off them , with three fours and a six.