KKR and a season decided elsewhere, ending as it began

There was a point, sometime between the warm-ups and the toss at Eden Gardens, when the evening still felt charged with possibility. Not realistic possibility but IPL possibility, which is different.

Kolkata Knight Riders needed a miracle just to get into a position where they could ask for another one. First, Mumbai Indians had to beat Rajasthan Royals. Then KKR would have had to beat Delhi Capitals by what would have been an absurd margin.

It was a long shot, but it was still a shot. And for a while, MI looked like they might do their part. The chase was under control, with two of the last five overs still to come from bowlers you would have preferred to line up later. Then came the over they didn't need to win. Jofra Archer ran in for his fourth, and Hardik Pandya decided to take him on, only for the slower ball to be pulled as far as long-on.

That was the moment. Not just for MI, but for PBKS and KKR. One ball, one decision, and it changed things across three cities. Small margins.

While Hardik's dismissal happened before KKR took the field, the final confirmation came only a few overs into their game. For a while, KKR chose not to let it matter. The management didn't pass the news along. "We got to know halfway when we finished our fielding, after 20 overs, before we started our batting," captain Ajinkya Rahane revealed.

Maybe it was KKR's way of staying in the present, holding on to what they could control. Because all season long, they had been at the mercy of events far away. Mustafizur Rahman wasn't available after developments between Dhaka and New Delhi led to the BCCI releasing him. Matheesha Pathirana got caught in an NOC tug-of-war in Colombo. Harshit Rana injured his knee in a warm-up game in Navi Mumbai. Even decisions taken in Australia around Cameron Green's workload dictated the combinations KKR played here in India.

All of these were separate events, unfolding in different parts of the world, but with consequences KKR felt for days and weeks after. That is how KKR's season felt.

"The first six games were really tough," Rahane said, referring to KKR's winless start. "Even though I thought we were playing really good cricket, there were patches, there were moments we didn't capitalize on. This format is about very fine margins."

What eventually changed was what KKR did with what they could control. They became the best catching side in the league. Rinku Singh and Varun Chakaravarthy put the World Cup fatigue behind them and rediscovered form. So did Finn Allen, who after feeling like a "shell of a human" early in the season began to play with freedom again. Around them, a few faces, new and old in the KKR setup, stepped up when needed.

Moments started going their way. The Super Over win, when Lucknow Super Giants didn't have their best bowler available because they had subbed him out, was one of them. They went on to win six of the next seven. "Hardly players get to experience the kind of comeback we did so far, from the seventh game onwards till now," Rahane said. "Hats off to each and everyone. Lots of guts, character and resilience from everyone."

All of it brought them here, to this final game. But like much of their season, even this night wasn't entirely theirs. A few overs in, MI's botched chase 2000 km away had already decided what this game could be. What remained here was for the cricket to unfold.

And you could feel the air go out of it. The crowd didn't swell, there were no unexplained cheers, no one from the dug-out came running to the middle with good news masquerading as drinks.

That KKR were no longer in contention showed on the field too. The best catching side in the league put down three chances, the most this season. Rinku Singh, so often their safest hands, dropped one before registering his first IPL duck. The batting slipped too, losing seven wickets for 35 runs in one of their worst collapses ever.

But it was hard to read too much into it. Their fate had already been decided elsewhere, which meant this game could only say so much. The season ended the same way it had unfolded, with something in another city deciding what this game meant, and small moments here on the field merely deciding how it will be remembered.