Match Review of Mumbai Indians vs Kings XI Punjab

Indian Premier League - Match review

Date : 2nd May 2011 Match No. : 40th
Teams : Mumbai Indians vs Kings XI Punjab
Venue : Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai
Umpires : K. Dharamsena and Paul Reifel Third Umpire: K. Hariharan
Toss : Kings XI Punjab won the toss and elected to field

Playing XI Mumbai Indians	Playing XI Kings XI Punjab
Sachin Tendulkar (c)	Paul Valthaty
Davy Jacob	Adam Gillchrist (c)
Ambati Rayadu	Shaun Marsh
Rohit Sharma	D. Hussy
K. Pollard	Dinesh Karthik
Andrew Symonds	Piyush Chawla
T. Suman	Abhishek Nayar
Harbhajan Singh	B. Sharma
Lasith Mallinga	Praveen Kumar
Abu Nechim	Ryan Harris
Munaf Patel	B. Bhatt

Mumbai Indians take on Kings XI Punjab on their home ground, Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai.

The Indians have been stationed at the top of the IPL standings all through this reason. Any guesses why? Here's the secret, their Skipper Tendulkar has been in and around that orange cap which belongs to the leading run scorer and their fast bowler Lasith Mallinga has been holding the purple cap, for being the leading wicket taker. They are doing wonders with the bat and bowl. However, they had their 1st batting collapse in their last match played against Rajasthan Royals. The team would like to forget that match as soon as possible and move on.

Kings XI Punjab's position on the point tally is very deceptive. Though they are not in the top 4 teams, but the fact that they have played the least number of games, can't be ignored. Having lost couple of matches in row, the team needed a win. Their Skipper Adam Gilchrist feels it's good to have back to back matches, to avoid negativity of the losses to get in the team.

Gilchrist won the toss and chose to field. Wankhede's pitch has been behaving differently in every match and today it looked like the slower one. Even Sachin Tendulkar stated that, having won the toss, he would have opted to field.

With a different game plan, Davy Jacobs and Sachin Tendulkar opened the innings for Mumbai Indians with support of house-full stadium. Adam Gillchrist realized the deeds of the pitch and surprised everyone with a spinner opening the bowling attack. B. Bhatt a fine spinner from Punjab completely obliterated the game plan of Mumbai's openers.

Davy Jacob was absolutely deceived by a fine spin by left arm spinner B. Sharma and got clean bold on the score of 10. Ambati Rayadu came to the crease to join the skipper. Soon both the batsmen realized that it's difficult to hit the big shots. They started ticking the score board with singles and doubles till the first strategic time out. Thereafter the duo played some good shots to take the run rate up. They put up a partnership of 95 runs of 72 balls, until Ambati got out on a marvelous catch by Dinesh Karthik just close to the ropes. He scored 51 in 37 balls with 8 boundaries and 1 huge six.

Shortly, Sachin also got dismissed the moment he reached his half century, scoring 51 in 45 balls. He got out on Ryan Harris full toss delivery while trying converting it into six. Mumbai Indians were on 129 with 3 wickets down in 16.2 overs.

Keiron Pollard, who has had a very ordinary tournament both with the bat and the ball but has been outstanding in the field, had to prove his worth. He scored rapid 20 runs in 11 balls with 2 sixes and 1 boundary. With Rohit Sharma's contribution of 18 runs in 11 balls, the Indians managed to put up a defendable total of 159 runs.

Adam Gillchrist and Paul Valthaty opened the batting for King XI Punjab. Tendulkar having read the pitch from the first innings got Harbhajan to open the bowling attack for the Indians. As it was not Gillchrist's day he got out in the 1st over itself. Shaun Marsh was the next batsman in. With the Skipper back to pavilion so early, both the batsman started playing watchfully. Though initially they were careful, once settled, they started playing their shots and put a partnership of 72 runs in just 60 balls. Valthaty showed some good hands with 2 sixes and a boundary. He got out to a fine catch on the individual score of 33 in 38 balls, by probably the best fielder in the side, Keiron Pollard. David Hussy and Dinesh Karthik could not do much and Punjab kept loosing the wickets on regular intervals.

Kings were 4 wickets down on the score of 83 in 13.2 overs. Few wickets down and the scenario completely changes. A target of 160 which was anyways challenging, now started looking impossible. Marsh who has been the star performer of Punjab kept hanging around to keep their hopes alive. He was joined by Abhishek Nayar, who could manage to make 14 in 9 balls.

Marsh was now joined by B Sharma, but the latter could not survive Mallinga's Yorker and was sent back immediately. At this stage, Punjab needed 44 runs of 20 balls with 4 wickets to spare. With Marsh hanging around, it was attainable. Once Marsh lost his wicket in the 19th over, it was all over for the Punjab. The equation was 29 required of 7 balls, a boundary on every ball, with tail-enders batting. Punjab managed to reach 136 by the end of 20 overs.

As they say, "Catches win Matches". Exceptional fielding got the Mumbai Indians another match taking them to the top of the table with 12 points. Whereas Kings XI Punjab are on the second last position with just 6 points.

Result: Mumbai Indians won by 23 runs.

The Awards:
Man of the match:
Keiron Pollard for his all round performance with bat and ball.

Maximum Sixes:
Keiron Pollard for hitting 2 sixes.

Kingfisher Fair Play Award
Kochi Tuskers tops the chart & Knight Riders at the bottom.

Orange Cap (The leading run scorer)
Sachin Tendulkar- Mumbai Indians

Purple Cap (The leading wicket taker)
Lasith Mallinga- Mumbai Indians

Question of the day:
Playing on the home ground, how big an advantage it is?



Last Updated on 5/3/2011