Four TNPL teams are level on eight points, and Salem Spartans have lost all six

Two results at the MA Chidambaram Stadium on Thursday night pulled the Tamil Nadu Premier League table into a knot. Nellai Royal Kings beat SKM Salem Spartans by five wickets. IDream Tiruppur Tamizhans beat Madurai Panthers by four. When the night was over, four teams sat on eight points from six games, split by nothing but net run rate, and each of them had exactly one league fixture left to play.

Nellai’s openers made the chase look easy, then it nearly was not

Salem chose to bat and made 140 for 7. Hari Nishaanth batted through the middle of it for 36 off 37 before he was run out, and Eshwar M added 31 off 24, but nobody got going at the rate the surface allowed. Emmanuel Cherian finished with 3 for 22 from his four overs and NS Harish took 2 for 21 in his.

Nellai then took 80 off the powerplay without losing anyone. D Santhosh Kumar hit 50 off 24 balls with seven fours and two sixes, Athish SR matched him with 50 off 29 including four sixes, and the opening stand was worth 96 inside eight overs. Rahil Shah dragged Salem back with 3 for 13 and B Iyappan took 2 for 30, and from 96 without loss Nellai slipped to 122 for 5. NS Harish, unbeaten on 21 off 14, took them home with 23 balls in hand. Athish was named player of the match.

Madurai were 76 for 7 and still made a game of it

The earlier fixture was the messier one. Madurai lost three inside the powerplay and were 76 for 7 in the 13th over, at which point the innings should have been finished. Atheeq Ur Rahman and Rohan Bhutra decided otherwise. Their eighth-wicket stand was worth 50 in 27 balls, Bhutra hitting four sixes in his 36 off 22 and Atheeq making 43 off 30, and Madurai got to 157 for 9. M Mathivannan had taken 3 for 18 for Tiruppur, T Natarajan 2 for 48.

Tiruppur’s captain Tushar Raheja then hit 48 off 17 balls with seven sixes, which is the sort of innings that settles a chase before the field spreads. Tiruppur were 81 for 2 after six overs. Shoaib Md Khan, brought on as Madurai’s impact player, pulled things back with 4 for 21, but Pradosh Ranjan Paul held one end for 65 not out off 45 and Tiruppur got there in 17.4 overs with 14 balls to spare.

Six teams are still chasing four places

The table after 24 of the 28 league matches reads like a mistake. Nellai, Tiruppur, Madurai and Trichy Grand Cholas all have four wins from six and eight points. Nellai lead on net run rate at plus 0.454, then Tiruppur at plus 0.390, Madurai at plus 0.021 and Trichy at minus 0.011. Behind them, VIDA Kovai Kings and Chepauk Super Gillies are on six points, and Kovai carry by far the healthiest net run rate in the competition at plus 1.140, a number built largely on the 116-run win over Trichy on 15 August.

That leaves six teams genuinely alive for four playoff places, because each side has one league game remaining. Dindigul Dragons, on four points, can finish no higher than six and are out. Salem cannot reach the top four either. Tiruppur, the defending champions, close against Salem, which is the kindest last fixture any of the top four has drawn: Nellai play Madurai, and Trichy play a Chepauk side who need the win.

Net run rate is going to do real work here. If Kovai and Chepauk both win their last games, six teams finish on eight points and the top four is decided on the decimal places, which is where Kovai’s cushion starts to matter and Trichy’s small negative figure starts to hurt.

Salem have not won a game

Salem Spartans have played six and lost six. Their net run rate is minus 2.366, more than two full runs worse than any other side in the competition, and they have one match left, against Tiruppur on Saturday afternoon. Thursday was a fair summary of the season: a competitive total on a good batting ground, and an opposition pair who put 96 on the board before the bowlers had worked out what length to hit.

Everything is decided by Saturday night

Four league matches remain, all of them at Chepauk. Kovai and Dindigul met in Friday’s afternoon slot, in a game rain interrupted early, and Chepauk Super Gillies face Trichy Grand Cholas in the evening. Saturday brings Tiruppur against Salem at 3.30pm IST and Nellai against Madurai at 7.30pm, and by the end of that second game the top four will be known.

Qualifier 1 follows on Sunday 23 August, the Eliminator on Monday, Qualifier 2 on Wednesday, and the final on Friday 28 August. All of them are at the MA Chidambaram Stadium. For a competition in its tenth season, having four teams tied and two more within a win of them going into the last round is about as well as the league stage could have been arranged.

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