Last night’s IPL match between Rajasthan Royals (RR) and Mumbai Indians (MI) was first high scoring game of this year’s edition, with both the teams posting more than 150 runs. MI emerged as an eventual winner beating RR by 27 runs. The win saw MI race to the top of the points table of whereas RR crashed to its first defeat in this year’s tournament.  

MI playing sans Sachin Tendulkar, who is out with a finger injury, after being put on to bat posted a target of 198. And later the way Rajasthan went about their run chase, it looked as if they would attain the target. But some great bowling at the end by Mumbai denied them the win.

Here are some hits and flops of the match between Rajasthan Royal and Mumbai Indians:

Hits and flop of Mumbai Indians:

Hits:

Kieron Pollard: Pollard played a major role in helping MI reach the score of 197 the highest score of IPL this season. He came at time when his team was down three wickets, but that did not see him under any pressure and he just went about hitting the bowlers all round the park at will. He scored 64 of 33 deliveries at a strike rate of 193.93 including six fours and four towering sixes.
When it came down to bowling, he took wickets at regular intervals including the all-important wicket of Ajinkya Rahane who cruising at the time when he was dismissed by Pollard. He went for runs in his spell but also did scalp four wickets and was adjudged as the man-of-the-match.

Ambati Rayudu: Rayudu, one of the most consistent performers for Mumbai Indians over the years, again helped his team in winning the match. He played a second fiddle to Pollard and after he was dismissed, Rayudu carried on and helped his team reach such a challenging target. He scored 47 runs off 32 balls, including one four and three sixes.

Munaf Patel: This was his second four wicket haul in this year’s IPL. He now has the most number of wickets in this year’s IPL so far and is currently donning the purple cap. He bowled exceptionally well to finish with figures of 28-4.

Hits and flops of Rajasthan Royals:
Hits:

Ajinkya Rahane: Ajinkya Rahane became the first player to breach the 100 runs barrier in this year’s IPL. He is currently the owner of orange cap and he scored 40 runs from 31 deliveries which included four in the last match. He was poised for a big innings but timely intervention from Pollard foiled all his plans.

Owais Shah: When he was on the crease, it looked like RR would see it to the end. But he was dismissed by Malinga for 76, which actually saw the downfall of RR. Shah was on a six hitting spree and belted five huge sixes along with five fours.

Flops:

Bowling department: Their bowling flopped as a whole and none of the bowlers had much up their sleeves to stop the run riot. Even Kevon Cooper their most successful bowler till now in this year fizzled and went for 43 runs taking only one wicket.

By Samikshan Dutta Choudhury
Indian Sports News