Mumbai Indians (MI) seem to be back to their original form, This team now looks scary because everyone, literally everyone, was playing as a team, which was lacking since Hardik Pandya became their captain. Mumbai Indians defended 206 runs against the undefeated Delhi Capitals (DC) in their home ground and announced that they are back and they are truly back now.
On a pitch which was dominated by batters, MI managed to defend a not-so-big total, and that against the powerful batting line-up of DC. Yes, it was not a high total at all because the average 1st innings score in Arun Jaitley Stadium, Delhi is around 235, which is massive, and Mumbai Indians were nowhere near that score.
Was Axar's decision to bowl first a good one?
Axar and Delhi Capitals kept only one thing in mind during the toss: the dew. Yes, there was a significant dew in the 2nd innings, but the new ball rule by the BCCI has neutralised the dew factor. If we go by the history of the last 5 matches in Delhi, all 5 matches are won by the team batting first, so it would have been better for the hosts if they had chosen to bat first, also considering the past few matches of MI where they have failed to chase a big total.
Even after bowling first, Delhi Capitals did a fantastic job by restricting Mumbai Indians to just 205 runs, which was easily chaseable, looking at the pitch and the dew factor.
Delhi's Batting
Delhi lost their 1st wicket on the first ball of the 2nd innings, but Abhishek Porel and the impact player Karun Nair had a fabulous partnership of 119 runs. It was all within the range for Delhi Capitals until the wicket of Karun Nair, who scored 89 off just 40 balls in his comeback match. To dismiss Karun Nair, MI needed some incredible delivery, and Santner delivered it for Mumbai Indians. It was a jaffa to dismiss Karun. Delhi needed 71 off 50 balls to win the match, looks an easy chase, right? But it was not, with such a strong batting order, DC bottled the run chase, and the hero for MI was the impact player Karn Sharma, getting 3 wickets for 36 runs, which also secured him the man of the match award.
What Made MI Win this Match?
MI ticked all the boxes to make sure they win this match, they played like a team for the first time in a while. The celebration showed how important the victory was for them.
Let us now see what all things MI did right to win this difficult match:
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Making Surya Kumar Yadav bat at no.3 and Tilak Verma at no.4.
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The finishing touches by Naman Dhir brought momentum to the game as MI has no proper finisher except Pandya.
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Giving Deepak Chahar the 1st over instead of Boult.
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Karn Sharma as an impact player was a top-notch decision, and also giving him crucial overs.
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Hardik's brilliant captaincy and field placement.
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Fielding was exceptional, the hat-trick of run-outs proved it in the end.
So overall, it was a complete team performance by the Mumbai Indians to win this game. The changes MI can bring to perform even better are giving Bumrah fewer overs in the powerplay and more in death and middle overs also, Hardik is a standout bowler for MI this season, so he should bowl more overs. Yesterday, he should have bowled the 17th over instead of Santner. They can also try Bevon Jacobs for the finishing role instead of Will Jacks.
For Delhi Capitals, I guess JFM should sit out now and make KL Rahul and Abhishek Porel open the innings with Karun Nair at no.3.
With inputs from agencies
Image Source: Multiple agencies
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