The five-time India Premier League winners breathed a huge sigh of relief as they notched up their first victory of the 2022 campaign, after eight consecutive losses on the trot. MI beat the in-form Rajasthan Royals, in a good display across departments, something that had not happened thus far this edition season.
RR were restricted to a modest total of 158 before the Mumbai batsmen, led by revelation Tilak Verma and the evergreen Suryakumar Yadav, made sure that the target was chased down, despite a brief scare towards the end of the chase. Mumbai will also be happy with the fact that Ishan Kishan played a fleeting yet impressive knock at the start of the Mumbai innings.
Mumbai skipper Rohit Sharma, who celebrated his 35th birthday on Saturday, won the toss and decided to bowl first. The decision turned out to be a well thought out one, as the wicket seemed two-paced, with the openers struggling to score at a quick rate.
Devdutt Padikkal’s innings ended at a run-a-ball 15 before RR captain Sanju Samson came in at number three instead of his usual number four position. Samson’s decision only gave momentary success, as he scored 16 off his first six balls before going for one big shot too many, holing out to Tim David off Kartikeya Singh.
The run machine Jos Buttler was subsequently joined in the middle by Daryl Mitchell. The New Zealander also faced the same problems as his teammates, as he struggled to get bat on ball.
Buttler was also in a similar situation, on 43 in 49 balls, before he took on the inexperienced Hrithik Shokeen, scoring four sixes in the first four balls of his over. However, the last ball brought about the end of Buttler, whose fantastic run in this edition of the IPL continued.
Hetmyer and Parag could not do much to give the innings a good final push, but it was, in fact, Ravichandran Ashwin who scored a bunch of boundaries towards the end to bring Rajasthan to a low yet fighting total of 158/6.
With a modest target to chase down, Kishan took the attacking route, something that was worryingly absent from the young man’s game so far this season. However, it was the same thing all over again from Rohit, whose lean patch continued. Kishan could not make it big, but it was a huge relief for the Mumbai faithful and the management.
Verma and SKY were tasked with the chase, and the two did a phenomenal job of it, taking the innings forward effortlessly, punctuated with regular boundaries as well. The two put on a stand of 81 as he brought up his half-century, proving yet again how invaluable he is to this Mumbai side.
Tilak was mighty impressive yet again, as he managed to soak in all the pressure from the other end, giving Yadav a much-reduced load. However, both of them lost their wickets with about 30 runs to get, giving the Mumbai Indians a brief scare. Nevertheless, Kieron Pollard and David were able to knock off the remaining runs until Pollard fell in the final over.
Daniel Sams did not let the match continue for much longer, smashing a huge six to give Mumbai their first win of the campaign after eight games.
Brief scores
Mumbai Indians 161 for 5 (Suryakumar 51, Varma 35, Ashwin 1-21) beat Rajasthan Royals 158 for 6 (Buttler 67, Meredith 2-24, Shokeen 2-47) by five wickets
