Cricket: Cards don't fall for Aces

Auckland fell agonisingly short in their opening qualifying match for the Champions League Twenty20 cricket tournament in India when they went down to the Kolkata Knight Riders by two runs.

In a match of extreme turnarounds, Kolkata romped through to 79-0 in their first nine overs before limping through to 121-6 off their 20 overs.

Auckland were then cruising at 60-1 in the ninth over, with Lou Vincent (40 off 37 balls) and Jimmy Adams at the crease, before losing their way and finishing with 119-6 in reply.

They needed 22 off the last two overs and Andre Adams hit 11 off the 19th, including a straight six off Jacques Kallis, but couldn't cope with Brett Lee's yorkers in the final over of the match.

The Aces gave themselves a chance with both bat and ball. Kolkata openers Manvinder Bisla and Kallis got off to a rollicking start, being particularly harsh on Chris Martin, before Michael Bates put the squeeze on. The left-armer returned excellent figures of 1 for 13 off his four overs and his teammates started to find their range.

Auckland's chase started disastrously when Martin Guptill was run out without facing a ball but Vincent and Jimmy Adams put their side in a commanding position. As Vincent in particular was finding the ropes - he scored 30 of his 40 runs in boundaries - it looked like the Aces would notch up a healthy net run-rate.

But two wickets in three balls changed the game and Auckland worked themselves into a corner they couldn't get out of.

The pitch was slow and the bowling steady but batsmen from both sides made life more difficult than it really was.

Auckland play Somerset tonight, needing a big win to have any chance of qualifying for the tournament proper.