IPL 2018, MI vs RCB: 5 reasons why Royal Challengers Bangalore lost to Mumbai Indians
Today’s match was a clash between the heavyweights as the Royal Challengers Bangalore took on the Mumbai Indians at the Wankhede stadium.
Both teams have struggled in this campaign and were desperate for a win. Virat Kohli won the toss and opted to bowl. RCB had a dream start as Umesh Yadav removed both Suryakumar Yadav and Ishan Kishan off the first two balls of Mumbai’s innings.
However, it went all downhill for RCB from thereon as Rohit Sharma and Evin Lewis thrashed the RCB attack to all parts of the ground.
RCB’s bowlers could not recover from the onslaught and ended up conceding a massive 213 runs, the highest total in this year’s IPL.
In reply, RCB lost the South African duo of Quinton De Kock and AB De Villiers in the fifth over and never really threatened to chase the target down.
Kohli played an excellent knock of 92 runs but it was not enough on the day as RCB lost the match by a huge margin of 46 runs.
Let us have a look at the five reasons why the Kohli led side lost the contest.
#1 The Hitman wakes up
Rohit Sharma has been struggling for runs ever since the South African tour. His slow innings against Delhi sucked the momentum out of Mumbai’s innings in the previous game.
But the “Hitman” decided to wake up today. Coming in to bat in a precarious situation, Sharma began with an imperious cover drive for four. In the beginning, he played perfect foil to the big-hitting Lewis.
Once Windies batsman departed, Sharma decided to open up his arms. Lofting sixes at will, the Mumbai captain raced to 94 runs off just 52 balls. His knock included 10 fours and five massive sixes.
He got out on the penultimate ball but by then his knock had virtually sealed the match.