Romario Shepherd’s 10-ball 39 not out outmuscled Tristan Stubb’s courageous 71 off 25 balls as Mumbai Indians ended its three-match losing streak in the Indian Premier League with a 29–run win against Delhi Capitals here on Sunday.
Conceding as many as 51 runs in the last two overs proved catastrophic for Delhi Capitals, whose bowlers remained wayward and batters lacked the spunk in the initial overs to go after MI bowlers, even though Stubbs went ballistic to make 25-ball 71 not out.
The right-handed Stubbs smacked as many as seven sixes and three fours but his effort could only reduce the margin of defeat for Delhi, who lost a flurry of wickets towards the end to finish at 205 for eight in reply to Mumbai Indians’ 234 for five. Once again poor quality of domestic talent in DC set-up proved to be their undoing.
Save Abhishek Porel, none of the other young uncapped Indians have measured up.
While Mumbai Indians managed to open their account in the points table after three losses upfront, the win also helped them leapfrog both Royal Challengers Bengaluru and Delhi Capitals to jump to the seventh spot while also improving their NRR to -0.704.
On their part, a fourth loss in five matches resulted in Delhi Capitals slipping down to the bottom of the table and they now also have the worst NRR of -1.370 among all teams.
Shepherd hurt Delhi Capitals the most, clobbering four sixes and two fours off Anrich Nortje’s 20th over to collect 32 runs and returned with the ball to get the prized scalp of David Warner (10).
Later in the game, Shepherd was on the receiving end too, ending as the costliest of all bowlers by giving away 54 runs among all those who finished their four-over spells for Mumbai.
Shepherd’s onslaught featuring four sixes and three fours topped a collective effort which Mumbai Indians came up with in the first half of the game to register their highest-ever score at their homeground.
When DC started its chase, Prithvi Shaw came up with a 40-ball 66 with three sixes and eight fours but the asking rate kept soaring beyond its reach.
The No 3 Porel hit a few attractive strokes but failed to make the most of a lifeline he got while batting on 30. The left-hander eventually perished for a 31-ball 41 with five fours, and following him back in the hut soon was Delhi captain Rishabh Pant (1).
Delhi’s lower order too cut a sorry figure with Axar Patel (8), Lalit Yadav (3), debutant Kumar Kushagra (0) and Jhye Richardson (2) falling in quick succession giving Gerald Coetzee, four wicket haul.
Earlier, Mumbai Indians batting unit fired in unison to post an imposing 234 for 5 against Delhi Capitals.
Nortje's final figures read a sorry 2 for 65 in 4 overs. Ishant Sharma, in all likelihood, playing his last IPL edition, is looking a pale shadow of his very old self, being taken for 40 in 3 overs. Mostly he is huffing and puffing to the bowling mark and also at times not able to finish his follow through. The pace has dipped alarmingly but DC have no option but to play him.
Shepherd was last to join the party but seemed to have made the most of it, after each of Rohit Sharma (49 off 27 balls), Ishan Kishan (42 off 23 balls), Hardik Pandya (39 off 30) and Tim David (45 not out off 21 balls, 2 fours, 4 sixes) also made merry in batting-friendly conditions at the Wankhede Stadium.
It was, however, a forgettable outing for Suryakumar Yadav, who perished for two-ball duck on his first game since mid-December last year.
But David’s fiery knock and Shepherd’s late fireworks ensured that they still had a huge total on board.
Mumbai’s cause in general was also aided by wayward Delhi bowlers through the course of the innings, who kept feeding them balls in the zone to hit or those with enough width off which the batters could take their chances.
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