Match Review-Royal Challengers Bangalore Vs Mumbai Indians-Match No.10-Dream 11 IPL 2020

 Welcome to another match review, by the way I beg all of your excuses for not making the match review of the last run feast in which RR chased down a mountain, which stood out to be the highest chase in the history of IPL.  Okay then, Mumbai Indians took on the Royal Challengers Bangalore in yesterday's game which was held in Dubai.  It was once again a nice batting wicket there at Dubai.  RCB were sent in to bat first by Rohit Sharma.  Me, being an MI fan was not impressed by this decision because teams have been losing repeatedly trying to chase a total in this IPL.  So let us get into the match and see what happened.   

1.  The Toss:

           The toss, as I said was won by Rohit Sharma and he opted to bowl.  Virat had no objections to bat first.  Rohit changed up his team as injured Ishan Kishan fully recovered from his injury and came back after missing two matches by replacing Saurabh Tiwary.  Apart from that there was no changes from their winning squad.  Once again Coulter-Nile missed out.  RCB who lost very badly against KXIP, made a whole lot of changes in their squad.  They removed struggling Dale Steyn and got the Sri Lankan pacer Isuru Udana in, who was making his IPL debut.  Also players like Umesh Yadav and Josh Phillipe were replaced by Gurkeerat Singh and Adam Zampa respectively.  So let us get into the first innings. 

2.  First Innings:

             RCB came out to bat with their familiar opening pair consisting of Aaron Finch and youngster Devdutt Padikkal.  Straight away RCB started to attack.  With Finch scoring runs at a formidable pace.  Finch was accompanied by luck.  A lot of his shots deserved to be caught but he was not caught.  Krunal Pandya dropped him once and the ball teased the fielders by falling in front of them.  Finch and Padikkal gave a blazing start to the RCB innings.  MI could not take a single wicket in the powerplay.  Finally Trent Boult broke the momentum by removing Finch.  After Finch's wicket, the runs dried up as RCB had some really quiet overs.

            In the next two overs they scored just 7 runs after Finch's wicket and lost Kohli as well.  Then Padikkal partnered with AB De Villiers and they had a 60 run stand.

  But the worse came for Mumbai once again in the death overs.  Mumbai gave away 40 odd runs in the last two overs of the innings.  Yes, Mumbai's death bowling really worries me.  Because in both their other two games, Bumrah and Mumbai leaked up plenty of runs in the death overs.  That was the case once again.  De Villiers and Shivam Dube smacked up 40 in two overs.  Shivam Dube finally batted well as he scored 27 off 10 balls to help RCB go past 200.  When I saw this scorecard, I was amazed to see that it is Dubai and not Sharjah.  200 in Dubai, i thought the game was already over.  But, will MI defy the odds and make this chase come true?  Let's find out in the second innings.

3.  Second Innings:

               The Second innings did not start that good as Rohit Sharma perished for 8.  He needed 10 more runs to complete his 5000 run mark in IPL, but he only managed to score 8.  When Washington Sundar came on in the powerplay, I thought something bad is going to happen here.  And it did happen.  Sundar was outstanding today.  He was banging in the deliveries one by one, and the MI batsmen were clueless, especially De Kock.  Except sundar, every other bowler in the RCB team conceded more than 40 runs.  But Washington though did all their work single handedly.  He continued to give headaches to MI fans by slowing up the Run Rate.  Thank god, he bowled his 3 overs in the power play.  Surya Kumar Yadav was inconsistent once again as he was out for a duck.

Suryakumar Yadav, After Getting Out For A Duck.

  Then, Rohit Sent in Hardik Pandya to up the Scoring Rate.  But Pandya was also struggling to find the middle of the bat.  He hit one six, but could not rotate the strike and keep the runs flowing.  At the other end Ishan Kishan was setting his innings up.  After Pandya got out in the 12th over when MI were literally struggling.  In came the Mighty animal Keiron Pollard.  But I lost hope when Pollard was finding it very difficult to get ball on bat.  Once again, at the other end, Ishan Kishan played very carefully and was also getting that odd boundary at times.

              But Kishan and Pollard changed the gears after the 15th over.  By the 15th over, Mumbai needed more than 90 runs off the last 5 overs.  I gave up and prayed MI to register a decent score.  But Pollard and Kishan, Man!  What a partnership.

  Seriously I never thought MI would get those 90 runs in the last 5 overs.  Pollard was toying with the bowlers.  He was hitting 6 after six and was clearing the boundary like anything.  Ishan Kishan was also adding up to the score card.  To help Mumbai's causes, RCB just could not hold the ball atleast for 5 seconds, all of them in the boundary line were dropping catches.   After a superb penultimate over from Saini, Mumbai required 19 off the last over.  They had a slow start to the over as Isuru Udana came close to win the game for RCB.  But in the last four balls he gave away 16 runs with Kishan scoring two sixes in it and eventually getting out for 99.  And Pollard scored a four when they required 5.  So finally we were here for another Super Over.  

4.  The Super Over:

               Mumbai Skipper Rohit made a big mistake by sending in Hardik along with Pollard.  You may ask me what is the mistake with that?  But there is a mistake.  Hardik Pandya was not in his best of forms in this IPL and has not batted that well in this game as well.  He has been sitting in the dug out for more than 40 minutes.  They should have sent in Ishan Kishan with Pollard to continue the momentum, but as Rohit Said in the interview that he was not fully fit to continue into the super over, they did not send him.  Atleast Rohit should have come in earlier than Pandya.  And MI scored a very low total of 7 runs in the super over.  

               The Chase was not that complicated for RCB they struggled in the first three balls, but reckless Bumrah gave away a lucky four to De Villiers.  As he lost his mind and bowled a bouncer with no one in the fine leg position.  Then Bumrah made a come back by yorking De Villiers.  But the game was already lost.  Bumrah was not co operating to the field set by Rohit.  In the last ball, Rohit packed the offside and gave big gaps in the leg side.  Bumrah should've bowled round the wicket and should've made the batsmen hit the ball in the off side of the ground.  But, Bumrah bowled over the wicket and made things easy for Kohli.  Kohli hit his trademark flick and got the win for RCB.

  Cricket was the true winner today, because in the Super Over, it comes to those small mistakes that you make.  Neither team wanted to lose today, but hard luck for Mumbai.  Now they should look to take on Rahul's Punjab on the first of october at every batsman's favorite venue, Sharjah.  Good Luck MI.

Final Summary:

         RCB: 201/3; 11/0 (Super Over) 

         De Villers: 55*(24); D. Padikkal: 54(40)

         T. Boult: 2/34 (4)

         MI: 201/5; 7/1 (Super Over)

         I. Kishan: 99(58); K.Pollard: 60*(24)

         I.Udana: 2(45) (4) 

 Man Of The Match: AB De Villiers