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Mumbai: Yusuf Pathan's innings was a special one and it needed an equally special effort from his team-mate R Satish to end it and pave the way for Mumbai Indians' narrow victory over Rajasthan Royals in the Indian Premier League on Saturday, said home team captain Sachin Tendulkar.
"Yusuf played a special innings. It was an equally special effort too to end it. Sathish showed good presence of mind," said Tendulkar referring to the bowler's effort in running out Pathan just when he looked like piloting the Royals to an incredible victory.
The right-handed Pathan struck a brutal 100 off just 37 balls with a whopping eight sixes and nine fours before backing up too far at non-striker's end to Sathish's bowling and the latter flicked the ball back on to the stumps to send the batsman trotting back when Royals needed 40 runs from the last four overs.
Tendulkar said he had told his team-mates of the danger posed by Pathan.
"Just before he came to bat it looked like we would romp home easily but I knew Pathan was in good form and if he got going he could spell danger and told my team-mates that they should not afford to relax," said Tendulkar whose team made 212/6 and then stopped their rivals at 208/7 to run out victors by four runs in their lung-opener.
Tendulkar was also full of praise for the manner in which Lasith Malinga bowled the last over and remarked that the injury sustained by his key spinner Harbhajan Singh towards the end of the Mumbai innings upset their bowling calculations.
"We had planned to have Zaheer and Malinga bowl the last four overs, but the way Pathan went I had to give them an over each in the middle which left them to bowl only one over at the end.
"Harbhajan Singh's injury was unfortunate as we lost a bowler who could bowl four overs well. We had to make up for it by using others," he said.
The champion batsman, who came into the event on the back of his record-setting double hundred - the first ever - in the ODI against South Africa, praised the efforts of young batsmen Ambati Rayudu and Saurav Tiwary in helping Mumbai Indians end up with their best-ever score in IPL.
"Both of them batted very well and more importantly stayed almost till the end. Both are talented players," he said.
The duo put on a century-stand and lifted Mumbai Indians from 70/3 to 180/4.
"Tiwary was with us last year too. It was Rayudu's first game for us. I had heard about him and his exploits as an India under-19 player," Tendulkar said.
