The Punjab Kings put in a dominating performance against Mumbai Indians in IPL 2021. Again it was a typical slow wicket in Chennai where shot-making was extremely challenging.
In the first half apart from Rohit Sharma and Suryakumar Yadav to an extent, no other Mumbai Indians batsmen could get going. The Mumbai Indians skipper batted brilliantly and scored 63 in 52 but got very little support.
Punjab Kings chase well and defeat Mumbai Indians
The Punjab Kings bowlers restricted Mumbai Indians to a par score of 131 runs. Mohammed Shami and Ravi Bishnoi picked two wickets each. The explosive middle order of Mumbai Indians again struggled to get going on a slow surface.
Then in the run chase Punjab Kings skipper KL Rahul dropped anchor and batted through. The wicket started spinning when the ball got old but MI maybe had 10-15 runs too little. When the asking rate jumped to 8 runs per over, Chris Gayle unleashed and hit some mighty blows. Eventually, it was an easy win for Punjab Kings as they chased down the total in the 18th over.
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Who Said What?
KL Rahul remained unbeaten on 60 whereas Gayle scored 43 in 35. Meanwhile here’s what the captains said in the post-match presentation. For his match-winning knock, Rahul received the man of the match award.
“Not enough runs. I still feel it is not a bad wicket to bat on. You saw how Punjab Kings batted and won the game with 9 wickets in hand. It is just the application which is missing in our batting. If you get 150-160 on this wicket then you are always in the game, that is something we failed to do in the last two games. You can look at it either way, I thought their bowlers bowled well in the powerplay, Ishan was trying to hit but couldn’t get it and even I was not able to hit. We have batted well in the powerplay previously but today we failed to do so. Something is missing in our batting line-up, we are not able to bat 20 overs in the fashion we want and something that we have to look at and see what we can do”, said Rohit.
“We don’t want to get too ahead of ourselves. Slowly we are coming together as a team. The guys we have backed are slowly coming through. Bishnoi came back today and the way he bowled was brilliant. We had heard that there was a lot of dew here. I felt like that could play a part. The drier ball started to grip, when it turns it gets really hard. It was good of Chris that he got through that period. He knew whom to target. That’s what you get with Chris, not just destructive batting but also experience of playing T20 cricket. He (Bishnoi) unfortunately missed the first few games, he’s worked with Anil bhai, he’s been brave. He held his composure. When I know what target I am chasing, it gets easier to pace the innings”, said Rahul.
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