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Mumbai: Mumbai Indians edged Royal Challengers Bangalore by 19 runs at the Wankhede Stadium on Tuesday night. It was MI's second win in seven matches, while RCB suffered their fourth defeat in seven matches.
The altercation - towards the end of MI's innings - that saw the West Indian Pollard and the Australian Starc almost come to blows influenced the outcome of the match a great deal as MI took 54 runs off last 20 balls, thanks largely to captain Rohit Sharma's 59 off 35 balls, to post a mammoth 187 for 5.
The drama began in the 17th over when Starc used some pretty choice language against Pollard after beating him with a bouncer. The West Indian signed to Starc to go away, and off the next ball backed away from the crease at the last minute. Starc instead of stopping himself followed the West Indian on the legside and almost hit him, leaving a seething Pollard to throw his bat towards the bowler in a menacing way.
The real match began after that. After Ashok Dinda gave away 13 runs in the 18th over, the next over saw Rohit take 24 runs off Varun Aaron with the help of three sixes and a four. Another altercation broke out between Pollard and Starc when Parthiv Patel and the Australian combined to run out the West Indian for 43 off 31 balls in the last over that yielded 11 runs.
The RCB chase began in a vengeful way, with Chris Gayle and Patel adding 53 runs in 5.1 overs. Patel hit some attractive boundaries before Harbhajan Singh cleaned him up for 26 off 19 balls. RCB captain Virat Kohli joined Gayle and even though MI were back in the contest with the wicket of Patel, Gayle fetched a six and a four off the last two balls off Harbhajan's over to peg the hosts back a bit.
Harbhajan eventually succeeded in getting Gayle out for 38 off 24 balls when the West Indian lost his stumps while attempting a sweep shot. Kohli played some attractive shots after a slow start; he was particularly dismissive towards Pollard. Kohli was lucky to get a reprieve when Jasprit Bumrah dropped him at short fine leg on 32 off Lasith Malinga.
Medium pacer Bumrah redeemed himself amply when he cleaned up the dangerous AB de Villiers (9) in the 13th over to bring MI back into the contest. However, it was the wicket of Kohli off Pawan Suyal, the injured Zaheer Khan's replacement, in the next over that, for the first time, put MI in the driver's seat.
RCB's all hopes of a win went with Yuvraj Singh (6) who succumbed to a brilliant run-out by Pollard with the West Indian showing some of his footballing skills. Pollard had the last laugh when he took a simple catch at extra cover to send Starc (5) back to the pavilion off Malinga. South African Rilee Rossouw gave RCB some remote hopes with a 24 off 14 balls but Malinga struck to seal it for MI. RCB ended their innings on 168 for 8, with Malinga, Bumrah, Harbhajan all taking two wickets each.
Earlier, after being put in to bat, MI lost opener Ben Dunk for 15 after the left-hander failed to clear Yuvraj Singh at mid-off off the bowling of Harshal Patel. Other opener CM Gautam and Ambati Rayudu put on 46 for the second wicket with Gautam playing the role of aggressor.
However, Rayudu (9), Gautam (30) and Corey Anderson (6) departed in the blink of an eye to give RCB the upper hand. While Rayudu missed a straight ball from Dinda, Gautam nicked one Aaron delivery to Patel and Anderson fell to a careless shot off the bowling of legspinner Yuzvendra Chahal. Things looked bad for MI at that time but a 97-run stand between Rohit and Pollard ensured they had plenty of runs to bowl at.
Earlier, Virat Kohli has won the toss and decided to Royal Challengers bowling first.
Rohit Sharma said before the toss that Zaheer Khan will miss the rest of the tournament, Delhi' young bowler Pawan Suyal replace him. RCB unchanged.
Teams:
Mumbai: Ben Dunk, Chidhambaram Gautam (wk), Ambati Rayudu, Rohit Sharma (Capt.), Corey Anderson, Kieron Pollard, Aditya Tare, Lasith Malinga, Harbhajan Singh, Pawan Suyal, Jasprit Bumrah
Bangalore: Chris Gayle, Parthiv Patel (wk), Virat Kohli (Capt.), Rilee Rossouw, AB de Villiers, Yuvraj Singh, Mitchell Starc, Ashok Dinda, Varun Aaron, Harshal Patel, Yuzvendra Chahal
Brief scores
Mumbai Indians - 187/5 (Sharma 59*, Pollard 43, Gautam 30)
Royal Challengers Bangalore - 168/8 (Gayle 38, Kohli 35, Bumrah 2-22, Malinga 2-29, Harbhajan 2-33)
Result - Mumbai Indians won by 19 runs
Points - Mumbai Indians 2, Royal Challengers Bangalore 0
