Mumbai Indians script a remarkable comeback to down Kings XI Punjab
Result : Mumbai Indians won by 4 wickets (with 1 ball remaining)
Man of the Match : Ambati Rayadu
Toss : Kings XI Punjab won the toss and elected to bat first.
After having lost their previous game due to the excellence of Shaun Marsh, the Mumbai Indians took on an upbeat Kings XI Punjab squad at Mohali. The Kings were still playing without their usual skipper Gilchrist who is recovering from his hamstring injury. Led by T20 specialist David Hussey, the Kings won the toss and opted to bat first going in with an unchanged side. Mumbai Indians however, made place for Clint McKay and Robin Petersen in the playing XI.
Saini and Mandeep got off to a slow start and played quite cautiously till Mandeep chased a wide delivery off RP Singh only to get caught by the keeper. Mumbai Indians kept a tab on the runs scored by Punjab, restricting them to only about 6 odd runs an over. Clint McKay struck in his second over dismissing Saini as both the openers were back in the pavilion early. Punjab still struggled to gain any momentum trotting sluggishly at an average run rate, although a busy partnership was taking place between David Hussey and Shaun Marsh. But an inspired bowling change by Harbjahan by bringing Franklin on, despite six other obvious options, brought the breakthrough, getting Marsh out cheaply.
David Hussey’s impressive innings of an unbeaten 68 off 40 balls took Punjab to a defendable score of 168, which is their highest total this season. His partnership with David Miller was crucial, and instrumental in getting those late runs for Punjab; they put together 89 from 43 balls. David Miller played a brilliant supporting role to Hussey’s innings, smacking the last two deliveries of the innings for back to back sixes, scoring an unbeaten 34 in 17 balls himself. Together, they put up 68 in the last 5 overs.
After 10 overs, KXIP – 56/2.
After 20 overs, KXIP – 168/3.
Surreal observation: Shaun Marsh top scored with 68* off 40 in Punjab’s last match, also against Mumbai. Today, David Hussey ended up with 68* off 40 too!
Mumbai on the other hand got off to a fairly decent start with Tendulkar and Franklin developing a steady partnership until veteran Azhar Mahmood struck in his first over to dismiss Franklin and got Tendulkar out on his first ball after the strategic timeout. Rohit Sharma was in good nick, striking the ball well, however, he ran out of partners at the other end. Dinesh Karthik came to the crease after the dismissal of Tendulkar, but he contributed only 3 runs to the team’s total before lobbing a Chawla delivery to Mahmood at short fine leg. Out came the destructive Keiron Pollard but even he couldn’t weather the storm as he skied one to Mandeep Singh at deep mid-wicket after scoring only 3 runs, giving Parvinder Awana his first wicket of the match. At this point, the Mumbai Indians were reeling at 90-4.
Rohit Sharma and Ambati Rayudu brought Mumbai back to life with an incredible partnership of 45 runs. Sharma scored a crucial 50 off just 30 balls, studded with 3 boundaries and 3 huge hits over the fence. Awana brought the Kings XI back into the match when he got the all important wicket of Sharma, caught at backward-point by Mahmood.
The captain, Harbhajan Singh, who came out next did not register a single run as he skied an Awana delivery to Marsh at long-off to give the bowler his third wicket.
Mumbai, at 135/6, looked down and out, but miraculously, a single expensive over from Chawla changed the entire complexion of the game. Robin Peterson’s incredible switch-hits and Rayudu’s explosive hitting propelled the Mumbai Indians to record 27 runs in the penultimate over.
Mumbai got the required 5 runs in the last over with only one ball remaining to script a glorious comeback. Rayudu finished with a crucial 34 runs off 17 deliveries with 2 fours and 2 sixes, earning him the MOM award, while Peterson was also unbeaten on 16 of 7 with a six and two boundaries.
After 10 overs, MI – 64/2.
After 19.5 overs, MI – 171/6