Rohit Sharma led Mumbai Indians are at the top of the table once again after defeating form-starved Rajasthan Royals in the 20th match of the Indian Premier League on Tuesday, 6 October.
It was business as usual for Mumbai in Sharjah with the team firing in all departments and picking up a humongous 57-run victory to maintain their momentum. The pace trio of Jasprit Bumrah, James Pattinson and Trent Boult stood out with the masterful control over the game and substitute fielder Anukual Roy took a blinder of a catch to make people stand and applaud from their homes. While all that happened in the second innings defending the massive 194 run target, earlier Suryakumar Yadav played the best match of his IPL career scoring an astonishing 79 off 47 balls.
On that note, here are the three reasons why Mumbai Indians flat-batted the Rajasthan challenge and now are at the top of the Indian Premier League 2020.
Within the first 5 balls of him coming into the crease, Mumbai must have felt that they were in for something special. His first boundary came from an on-drive with Yadav caressing the balls between the mid-on and the short mid-wicket.
While runs kept coming, he faced an absolutely awful face height beamer from Jofra Archer that he could barely avoid. Getting hit by a bouncer later on, Yadav’s stood up and replied back with a six off the next delivery.
He was the chief architect of the Mumbai innings ably supported by Rohit Sharma and Hardik Pandya who made important contributions to take the game out of Rajasthan’s reach.
This man is slowly, but surely returning to his prime. After picking up 2 wickets in his last match against Sunrisers Hyderabad, Jasprit Bumrah produced the best figures of his IPL career tonight picking up 4 wickets for just 20 runs.
The MI pace bowling unit picked up a total of 8 wickets on the night and it again came to fore how much planning the Zaheer Khan-led MI thinktank does before coming into every game.
Kiwi pacer spoke at the end of the game and said that while he would love to see the ball doing more at the beginning of the innings, but the fact the team is hunting in pack is something satisfying to watch.
“I think the whole pack is working together. I think we have a pretty clear game plan. It's a good wicket, but the way we've managed to take wickets [has been good]. You're always challenged with quality players, intimidating you a bit. But I think I'd love to see the ball swing around a little more at the top. Hasn't been a huge feature of this tournament.”
Despite making changes at the Rajasthan Royals’ top order things are not coming together for Steve Smith and his team. The top order has failed for three matches straight and Sanju Samson’s inconsistency debate once again has come to the fore. Smith himself has not spent a lot of time out there in the middle himself spending just 19 balls in his last three matches.
With Ben Stokes set to join the team on 10th of this month, Rajasthan have to try and get their campaign back on track against probably the strongest side in this year’s IPL, the Delhi Capitals on Friday, 9 October.
Speaking after the game, Smith said that they do not need to panic and rather implement their plans on the field better to get the desired results. He also said that they would like to build some momentum before Stokes comes in.
“I don't think we need to panic too much. It's just about implementing our plans and playing good cricket for longer. Hasn't been a good last three games. Need to turn it around and get some momentum.”
Powered by Froala Editor