Opener Phil Salt celebrates KKR's third IPL title win on video call from UK

Chennai (Tamil Nadu) [India], May 27 (ANI): England and Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) opener Phil Salt celebrated his side's third Indian Premier League (IPL) title win via video call following his team's victory. On Sunday, just after KKR lifted the trophy under Shreyas Iyer's captaincy, the first video call was made to Salt, who had formed a formidable opening pair with Sunil Narine before he departed back home for a T20I series against Pakistan, which started on May 22 and will go on till May 30, in order to prepare them for ICC T20 World Cup, starting from June 1 in West Indies and USA.

KKR took to their official X handle, writing, "Yes, the first video call was to @PhilSalt1

#AmiKKR."

In 12 matches for KKR this season, Salt scored 435 runs at an average of 39.54 and a strike rate of 182.00, with four half-centuries. His best score was 89*. Salt was in particular, sensational at Kolkata's home run at the Eden Gardens stadium, scoring 358 runs in seven matches at an average of 58.33 and a strike rate of 185.19. He scored all his four half-centuries at the iconic venue.

Just before the start of the season, Salt, who went unsold in the IPL auction last year, was bought by KKR as a replacement player for opener Jason Roy, the Englishman who opted out of the league due to personal reasons.

Coming to the match, SRH won the toss and elected to bat first. KKR rocked SRH with continuous wickets, with the big buy Mitchell Starc justifying his Rs 24.75 crores price tag. Only skipper Pat Cummins (24 in 19 balls, with two fours and a six) and Aiden Markram (20 in 23 balls, with three fours) touched the 20-run mark and SRH was bundled out for 113 in 18.3 overs.

Andre Russell (3/19) was the top bowler for KKR. Starc (2/14) and Harshit Rana (2/24) also contributed well with the ball. Sunil Narine, Varun Chakravarthy and Vaibhav Arora took a wicket each.

KKR pulled off the run-chase of 114 runs in just 10.3 overs with eight wickets in hand, with Venkatesh Iyer (52* in 26 balls, with four boundaries and three sixes) and Rahmanullah Gurbaz (39 in 32 balls, with five fours and two sixes) shining for KKR.

Summarizing the second T20I between England and Pakistan which took place on Saturday, A fine half-century from skipper Jos Buttler and fine spells from pacers Reece Topley and comeback man Jofra Archer powered England to a 23-run win over Pakistan in the second T20I at Birmingham on Saturday.

With this win, England take a 1-0 lead in the four-match series. The first game was washed out by rain.

England have announced their squad for the T20 World Cup.

England squad: Jos Buttler (c), Moeen Ali, Jofra Archer, Jonathan Bairstow, Harry Brook, Sam Curran, Ben Duckett, Tom Hartley, Will Jacks, Chris Jordan, Liam Livingstone, Adil Rashid, Phil Salt, Reece Topley, Mark Wood. (ANI)