Another run-fest at the Wankhede Stadium saw PBKS prevail over MI by 13 runs, courtesy an outstanding death-overs spell from Arshdeep Singh. The defeat snapped Mumbai’s 3-match winning streak and helped PBKS set their campaign back on track after their hurting loss against RCB.
After winning the toss, Rohit Sharma chose to field first on a ground well-known for chasing. The Punjab Kings’ opening failed yet again as Cameron Green prized out Matthew Short with a short of length ball which the batter could only hit as far as mid-wicket inside the circle. Atharva Taide joined Prabhsimran as the duo began their audacious strokeplay to unsettle the MI bowlers, reaching 58/1 in the powerplay itself.
But Arjun Tendulkar came back to trap Prabhsimran plumb in front of the stumps with a brilliant yorker. Piyush Chawla worked Liam Livingstone over and threw a wide one to have him stumped. Atharva Taide followed three balls later as he unfortunately deflected a missed sweep back onto the stumps. Harpreet Bhatia and Sam Curran joined hands and stitched together a slow stand, getting the total to 118/4 after 15 overs.
The pair shifted gears when Arjun Tendulkar strayed from his radar and was taken apart for a massive 31-run over. Archer conceded 13 in the next over, then Bhatia smashed Green for two sixes before falling to a pinpoint yorker which the batter chopped on to see his stumps rattled. Jitesh Sharma entered and hammered two more sixes to spoil Green’s numbers. Curran took two boundaries off Archer to bring up his fifty before getting out caught and bowled to the right-arm speedster. Jitesh continued his onslaught as he hit two more sixes off Behrendorff but the left-arm quick responded with an inch-perfect yorker. But Punjab finished at a huge total of 214/8, tearing apart the MI pacers.
Mumbai’s chase was jolted early when Kishan spliced a wide Arshdeep Singh delivery towards square where Matthew Short took an exemplary running catch. With the required run rate around 11, Cameron Green and Rohit Sharma began counter-attacking as MI reached 54/1 in six overs.
Rohit was particularly aggressive against the spinners, before a loose chip shot lobbed one to Livingstone’s hands to dismiss the MI skipper. Suryakumar Yadav pressed at full throttle from the word go. He started off with a four against Rahul Chahar, hit a hattrick of fours against Livingstone, picked up a six off Ellis, a four and a six off Sam Curran. Green then broke the shackles to power Chahar over long-on and brought up his second consecutive fifty. He smacked Ellis for a six and four, to which the pacer answered with a deceptive back-of-the-hand slower ball that Green miscued to get caught by Sam Curran at extra cover.
But Suryakumar kept going from one end, ramping and whipping Curran to reach his first fifty of the season, and also his fastest in IPL. MI appeared to be in control but soon Suryakumar mishit one to long-on. Tim David hit a few blows to bring the equation to 16 off 6. He took a single on the first ball, followed by a dot. Needing 15 off 4, Arshdeep yorked Tilak Varma to break the middle stump into two with the ball tailing in a bit. Nehal Wadhera came to the crease as the impact substitute but was dismissed in exactly similar fashion, again the middle stump broke into two, and the match was done right there. Arshdeep gave away no extras to complete a match-winning spell of 4-0-29-4, and eventually PBKS went home by 13 runs.
