Suryakumar helps Mumbai win, keep playoff hopes alive
BREATHER Opener hits second fifty in a row as MI beat Knight Riders by 13 runs to notch up fourth win this season
MUMBAI: bowlers in the first six overs.
However, once they both departed, the run rate came to a standstill for a while before Hardik Pandya accelerated scoring to help MI finish on 181/4. KKR were restricted to 168/6.
While it wasn’t a towering total to scale, it proved enough for the MI bowlers. The Knights promoted Shubman Gill up the order but the teenager was dismissed for seven. Chris Lynn too followed, after a 13-ball 17. Robin Uthappa and Nitish Rana led a recovery but with 44 runs on the board, the former received a lifeline when Mayank Markande dropped a sitter. By the time Markande dismissed Uthappa, he had notched his 23rd IPL half-century, and the first of the season. Double whammy
It was smooth sailing as Robin Uthappa and Nitish Rana paced their innings with the latter even leaving deliveries in Test-match fashion. They stitched a 84-run partnership for the third wicket, but just when it seemed they
17 (13) S Gill c Krunal b Hardik 7 (5) R Uthappa c Cutting b Markande
54 (35) N Rana c Bumrah b Hardik 31 (27) D Karthik not out 36 (26) A Russell c Krunal b Bumrah 9 (10) S Narine c Sharma b Krunal 5 (4) P Chawla not out 0 (0) Extras (b 4, lb 4, w 1) Total (6 wickets; 20 overs) FOW: 1-28, 2-28, 3-112, 4-115, 5-131, 6-163
Bowling: M Mcclenaghan 4-0-30-1, J Bumrah 4-0-34-1, H Pandya 4-0-19-2, K Pandya 3-0-29-1, M Markande 3-0-25-1, B Cutting 2-0-23-0 would finish the job, both were dismissed in the space of seven deliveries to swing the balance in favour of the hosts.
With both back in the pavilion, a lot was expected of Andre Russell and Dinesh Karthik as they had ample time to recover from the jolts. Instead, they ate up deliveries, scoring 30 runs off 27 balls with the Jamaican also heading back. It was a poor demonstration from the KKR skipper, who failed to accelerate when it was most required, despite facing the lion’s share of the deliveries.
By the time he started his charge in the penultimate over, the game was all but gone from KKR’S grasp. Jasprit Bumrah and Hardik
Pandya used their variations to check Karthik and Russell before Markande and Ben
Cutting slowed down scoring.