Mumbai Indians have finally registered a win in the UAE phase of the IPL 2021 against Punjab Kings. Rohit Sharma won the toss and opted to bowl first.
While Punjab got off to a steady start, they could only manage 135 runs with Markram top-scoring 42 off 29. However, while chasing, Mumbai didn’t have a good start and they lost 3 wickets within 10 overs. But Hardik Pandya and Saurabh Tiwari steadied the ship and a quick cameo from Pollard sealed the deal.
Kieron Pollard now becomes the only player in T20 history to aggregate 10000 runs and 300 wickets in a career! #MI #IPL2021 #IPLinUAE #MIvPBKS #MIvsPBKS #PBKSvsMI #PBKSvMI
— Mohandas Menon (@mohanstatsman) September 28, 2021
Kieron Pollard, the Player of the Match said: “Very important to get my 300th wicket. I know what I can do in all the facets of the game. I will be more than happy to do what the team needs of me. You try and watch and target whom you can target and not. I enjoyed my 300th wicket which was KL and obviously it’s a landmark and very special. For me, it’s just of trying to practice and it’s all about practing and batting according to the situation. I admit that I don’t have pace, swing and seam but I can use my brain and get the job done. For us it’s very important to get these 2 points and hopefully this will be the much-needed spark in the dressing room.”
Rohit Sharma said: “We do agree that we didn’t play to our potential, but it’s a long tournament and we need to stick to our plans and reading the situations is very important and we can take a lot of confidence from that. Important not to lose the guard. The way he (Hardik) understood the situation was very crucial from a team’s perspective, it’s important for him to spend the time in the middle as he’s coming back from an injury. It’s a tough call (on dropping Ishan Kishan) and he seems very confident and the reply you get from him was very boosting as well. Saurabh has played the perfect role today and he’s done well to nudge around in the middle overs. We are gonna back him (Ishan Kishan) as he’s a very important player for us. The ball was coming off when we started off and the grass is coming off the surface in the middle overs and we need to adjust to the conditions. He (Pollard) is one of our key players. Crucial part of MI for so many years. He will be happy with taking the ‘Man of the Match’ for his bowling performance.”
Saying good night from Abu Dhabi with a few smiles 😊😊 #VIVOIPL pic.twitter.com/yeB4veZXQr
— IndianPremierLeague (@IPL) September 28, 2021
KL Rahul said: “It was a great fight, but 135 was not enough on this pitch. We should have got about 170. The boys showed a lot of fight with the ball, we have done that two games in a row. The next three games will be interesting for us as the table looks interesting. It is what it is, we haven’t been able to handle the pressure. We’ll learn more if we play more together as a team. We need to be positive. We have three games, so we need to take one game at a time. We need to go out there and enjoy ourselves. All our games in the UAE have gone down to the wire, hopefully we can build on that.”
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