IPL 2019: Chahar, Pandya brothers set up Mumbai's dominant win

Delhi Capitals stumbled to its third defeat at home this season, a 40-run drubbing by Mumbai Indians at the Ferozeshah Kotla.

Published : Apr 19, 2019 00:25 IST , New Delhi

Rahul Chahar finished with figures of 3 for 19 in Mumbai Indians win at Ferozeshah Kotla.
Rahul Chahar finished with figures of 3 for 19 in Mumbai Indians win at Ferozeshah Kotla.
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Rahul Chahar finished with figures of 3 for 19 in Mumbai Indians win at Ferozeshah Kotla.

Leg-spinner Rahul Chahar (3 for 19) broke the back of Delhi Capitals’ batting in its chase of 169 to help Mumbai Indians claim a 40-run win at the Ferozeshah Kotla here. It propelled the side to the second spot in the points table. Chahar took three top-order wickets – of Prithvi Shaw, Shikhar Dhawan and captain Shreyas Iyer – to make the contest one-sided after the openers provided a rapid start for the home side.

Wickets tumbled one after the other as Capitals fell to its third defeat here out of four contests.

Chahar’s brilliance was backed up by entertaining cameos from Krunal Pandya (37, 26b, 5X4) and his brother Hardik (32, 15X4, 2X4, 3X6) that gave Mumbai Indians the total to call the shots.

IPL 2019: Full coverage

Still, it was anybody’s game during the PowerPlay overs when Capitals came out to bat. Shaw and Dhawan struck seven fours and a six in a lively opening partnership of 49. Trying to be enterprising against Chahar in the seventh over, Dhawan attempted a reverse-sweep only to be trapped leg before. In Chahar’s next over, Shaw came down the pitch to attempt an aggressive stroke but failed to time the ball and was caught at long-on by Hardik.

Three more wickets were to fall for 17 runs. Krunal, a left-arm orthodox spinner, bowled a yorker to dismiss Colin Munro. Soon after, Iyer was undone by a sharply spinning delivery from Chahar that pitched on leg-stump and hit the off. In the 14th over, Rishabh Pant attempted a swipe across the line to Jasprit Bumrah and was bowled; with the required run-rate having crossed 15, and with only five wickets left, the contest was virtually over.

Highlights: Capitals vs Indians

Axar Patel and Chris Morris hung around for a while but only delayed the inevitable. Eventually, they were dismissed too, as Mumbai Indians’ pacers polished off the tail.

Mumbai Indians also had a faltering innings at one point but it was brought back to life by the Pandya brothers. Having arrived to bat at the conclusion of Quinton de Kock’s promising innings of 35 (27b, 2X4, 2X6) that ended abruptly via a run-out, in the 10th over, Krunal laid anchor and exploded at the death in the company of Hardik to take his team to a challenging total given the nature of the pitch.

The variable bounce was palpable, and the slowness and turn available allowed spinners to derail the innings. First, Rohit Sharma (30, 22b, 3X4, 1X6) was undone by a delivery from leg-spinner Amit Mishra that pitched on length and seemed to stop as it turned sharply to strike the middle stump. It ended a prospering first wicket partnership after the openers had collected 57 runs in the PowerPlay.

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By the 11th over, the team had lost two more wickets. Ben Cutting attempted to play a sweep off left-arm spinner Axar Patel and was adjudged leg-before-wicket in the eighth over. Before long, the set De Kock, who had struck two fours and two sixes until then, was run-out; Suryakumar Yadav (26, 27b, 2X4) played a delivery to backward-point and kept looking at the ball even as De Kock ran through to his end.

Krunal and Suryakumar attempted to hit out but managed singles in the middle overs. The side laboured to 100 in the 14th over; 48 deliveries had to be consumed for the second fifty. Krunal seemed desperate to get hold of some mighty blows but managed only singles in this initial part of his innings. He managed to get his first boundary in the 16th over – a glance to fine-leg off fast bowler Kagiso Rabada.

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Krunal and Hardik Pandya put up a crucial 54-run stand off 26 balls to propel Mumbai to 168.
 

It was only after Suryakumar’s hardworking  innings ended that the innings found some impetus. Seamer Keemo Paul bowled an expensive 18th over, getting hit for two fours and a six. First, Krunal played a delightful late-cut from middle-stump to get the delivery to the third-man boundary. Then, Hardik collected a four through a hoick to deep midwicket. He followed this up with a six through long-off.

Chris Morris started the penultimate over impressively with his accurate yorkers. But erred in the final two deliveries by bowling full tosses to Hardik, who muscled them for a six and a four. Hardik managed one more six in the final over off Rabada, before mistiming an attempted bellicose stroke and departing. Krunal provided the finishing touches with two more fours in the over as Mumbai Indians ended its innings on a high.

The fast bowlers – barring Ishant Sharma – were all expensive, nullifying the spinners’ frugal overs in the middle. The total was 14 more than the average first-innings score here, and as it turned out, quite sufficient.

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