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Sunil Narine hammered a quickfire half-century as Kolkata Knight Riders outclassed Royal Challengers Bangalore by four wickets to start their campaign with a victory in the 11th edition of the Indian Premier, at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata, on Sunday.
Promoted to open the innings, Narine smashed five sixes and four boundaries in his 19-ball knock of 50 to rally KKR after the early dismissal of Chris Lynn (5).
Nitish Rana, who did the star turn with the ball with wickets of Virat Kohli and AB de Villiers off successive deliveries, played a handy innings of 34.
Captain Dinesh Karthik guided KKR home with a steady knock of 35 as KKR began their campaign in IPL-11 with a win.
Earlier, part-time spinner Nitish Rana struck twice in a sensational one-over spell before Mandeep Singh smashed a whirlwind 18-ball 37 to take Royal Challengers Bangalore to a challenging 176 for seven.
Opener Brendon McCullum set it up for RCB with a sensational 27-ball 43 while AB de Villiers made the Eden Gardens crowd cheer for the visitors with his scintillating 23-ball 44, which was studded with five mouth-watering sixes and one boundary.
Indian captain Virat Kohli (31 off 33) played the second fiddle and after RCB's star were dismissed in quick succession, it was a blazing cameo by Mandeep which enabled RCB post a challenging total.
With de Villiers blazing all guns at one point their run graph was looking past 200 but part-time off-spinner Rana produced twin dismissals in two balls -- De Villiers and Kohli -- to reduce RCB for 127 for four in the 15th over.
De Villiers top edged, while Rana yorked Kohli to break the quickfire 64-run partnership off 36 balls as KKR pulled things back but Mandeep produced a scintillating 18-ball 37 -- with two sixes and a four against Vinay Kumar in the last over -- to rally the visitors
Bowling with a remodelled action after his latest call of suspect action in the Pakistan Super League last month, Sunil Narine returned with 1/30 while fellow mate Andre Russell conceded 10 runs from two overs.
Earlier, McCullum once again shone in a debut innings for the Bangalore franchise and became the second player to complete 9000 T20 runs.
His innings gave RCB a flying start with 52/1 in the Powerplay before Narine tied up the proceedings from one end.
Narine was brought on in the first over after Powerplay and bowled four dot balls to Kohli, conceding just two runs.
Beating McCullum with his change of pace, Narine cleaned up the New Zealander and gave his trademark deadpan expression.
But de Villiers ensured that the run-rate does not slide further as he lifted the atmosphere with his two stunning sixes off Kuldeep's successive deliveries.
The South African easily picked up a Kuldeep googly before launching him effortlessly with an inside-out six, and followed it up with straight six.
Vinay Kumar was wayward with the new ball and McCullum made most of it smashing him for 14 runs in the first over that included two fours and one six.
He also bowled the last over and was smashed for consecutive six, four and another six before dismissing Mandeep and Chris Woakes off the last two balls of the innings.