Jaipur: After restricting Mumbai Indians to 142 runs, Rajasthan Royals batted superbly to defeat the visitors by seven wickets in the Champions League T20 opener at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium here on Saturday.
Sanju Samson once again played a heroic innings for Royals and top-scored with 54 runs off 47 balls, including eight boundaries. Ajinkya Rahane (33), Shane Watson (27) and Stuart Binny (27) were the others contributors to their side's total.
Earlier, Mumbai Indians had a bad start as they lost Dwayne Smith and Dinesh Karthik early and with Sachin Tendulkar and Ambati Rayuddu gone by the ninth over, Mumbai were in a big trouble, losing four wickets for just 43 runs.
However, skipper Rohit Sharma held the fort and added 52 runs with Keiron Pollard before falling at an individual score of 44. Thereafter, Pollard added 25 runs with Harbhajan Singh, before getting out at 42. Harbhajan scored 8 runs off 4 balls before running himself out on the penultimate ball of the innings.
Vikramjeet Malik bowled an impressive spell, taking three wickets for just 24 runs in his four overs.
Chasing the target, Royals lost skipper Rahul Dravid in the second over. Hoever, Rahane and Samson combined well to steer his team to safety. After Rahane (33) fell in the 12th over, Samson find an able partner in Shane Watson. Later, Watson and Stuart Binny took their team to victory with two balls remaining.