I felt that the IPL was boring in this season due to the lack
of last over finishes and the boring old formula of win the toss bowl first and chase down
the score. This match bucked the trend as Suresh Raina won the toss and decided
Gujarat Lions would bat first. At the halfway point it seemed to have been a
bad decision, but Mumbai’s slow bowlers conceded 37 runs from a combined 8
overs and pacer Mitchel McClanaghan was carted for 50 runs in his 4 overs.
Pacer Hardik Panndya
was completely left out of the attack. Maybe it was a good decision as the
pitch would get slower and the ball not come onto the bat as the game progressed.
Mumbai started off in imperious fashion scoring 40 of 3 overs before a run out
sent the dangerous Jos Butler back to the dressing room. Parthiv Patel seemed
to be the only one who could get into some sort of rhythm. (possibly he was
motivated to perform in front of his home state) Mumbai’s momentum was halted
when spinner Ankit Soni and Suresh Raina began bowling in tandem. Master of
changes in pace James Faulkner was the pick of the bowlers with 3 wickets but
Gujarat missed a trick as Jadeja only bowled a solitary over. Despite the loss of momentum, Mumbai seemed to
be in the driver’s seat at 104-2 before Rohit Sharma played a horrible innings
of 5 from 13 and piled the pressure onto his own side’s lower order. Mumbai
lost wickets and regular intervals but still seemed to be on course for the win
with 4 wickets left before they were undone by wonderful fielding by the Lions.
Irfan Pathan’s direct hit from the boundary to get rid of
McClanaghan gave Gujarat hope as they had entered Mumbai’s tail of Bumrah and
Malinga. Krunal Pandya was the last recognised batsman. He hit a six of the
first ball of the last over to keep Mumbai in the hunt with 5 needed from 5.
Jadeja’s two direct hits in the last over especially the one
of the last ball from which 1 run was needed, where he had just 1 stump to aim
at and had he missed Mumbai would have won the match. 3 run outs in the last 8
balls!!!!! And now we had ourselves a super over
As per Super Over laws the team that was chasing (Mumbai)
would bat first. In the event of a super over tie, the team which had the most
hits to and over the fence would be the winner.
Mumbai chose Kieron Pollard, Jos Butler and Krunal Pandya as
their batters for the 6 balls. Jos Butler was a good choice but I felt Parthiv Patel should
have gone in as he was absolutely bludgeoning it.
Butler misread the fist ball and just tapped it towards the
off side and took a single. Ideally it should have been deposited in the stands
in the arc between long on to deep mid wicket. Pollard managed to hit a 4 on the next ball and carted the
next one into the stands. He was given a ball which had to be played over extra cover
but he ended up glancing the ball to long on and was caught.
Jos Butler crossed over to take strike and he skied the next
ball which was caught by youngster Ishan Kishan. Mumbai had only played 5 balls
of the super over and has scored of just 3.
It seemed over as Gujarat had to get 12
Bumrah was selected to bowl for Mumbai and despite starting
off with a no ball he managed to find the blockhole for the free hit and then
barring a wide ball he completely bamboozled Aaron Finch and Brendon McCullum
over the next four balls.
Mumbai had victory in sight, let Gujarat in and then
snatched vixtory from the jaws of defeat. Hoping for more thrillers of this sort in the remainder of
the IPL.
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