Mumbai Indians(MI) were defeated by Royal Challengers Bangalore(RCB) in the match 18 of Indian Premier League(IPL) 2022 on Saturday evening at the Maharashtra Cricket Association Stadium in Pune.
RCB defeats MI by 7 wickets
Royal Challengers Bangalore had invited Mumbai Indians to bat first. RCB skipper Faf du Plessis had confirmed the debut of star all-rounder Glenn Maxwell in this season replacing Sherfane Rutherford, while for Mumbai Indians, Jaydev Unadkat and Ramandeep Singh also made their debuts, replacing Tymal Mills and Daniel Sams.
Suryakumar Yadav played a pivotal role for Mumbai as he came up with a brilliant knock of an unbeaten 68 to rescue MI. The side had suffered an early collapse and managed to post a total of 151 runs at the expense of six wickets. After being put into bat first, Rohit Sharma-led side had gotten off to a bright start in the powerplay but the star batter Rohit Sharma was removed by Harshal Patel.
Mumbai Indians suffered a top-order collapse, courtesy some fine bowling and fielding by RCB. RCB did well to put up a strong challenge in the way of their opponents with the ball. They managed to reduce the Rohit Sharma and co. to 63 for five. At one point, Mumbai Indians had slumped to 79/6 after losing six wickets for just 29 runs. Wanindu Hasaranga and Harshal Patel also tallied a couple of wickets each while Akash Deep has also picked up a wicket.
Chasing the target, skipper Faf du Plessis was dismissed on just 16 runs to add to the woes of RCB. Anuj Rawat scored his maiden IPL fifty as he shared a 50-run partnership with Virat Kohli, who emerged with 48 runs off 36 balls. Rawat dominated the bowlers before he got run out having scored 47-ball 66 runs.
The brilliant all-round performance from Royal Challengers Bangalore was expected and that earned them the victory. They reached the target score with 9 balls still left to spare. They have now got three wins in four games, while misery continues for Rohit Sharma and co.
