After five matches and three defeats, Mumbai Indians finally played like Mumbai Indians. That Rajasthan Royals have been one of the weakest teams of this year’s IPL might have been a factor, but Mumbai played their best cricket of the season at the Kotla in Delhi on Thursday to win by seven wickets.

Rohit Sharma’s men first bowled well to pull back Rajasthan’s innings in the last five overs. But they still had to chase a 172-run target, that too with a batsman short as they opted to drop Ishan Kishan and play pacer Nathan Couler-Nile instead.

But with Quinton de Kock finally rediscovering his touch, the job was accomplished without much fuss. The South African’s sequence of scores before Thursday’s match read 2, 40, 2, 3. De Kock broke free of the shackles emphatically with an innings of 70 not out off 50 balls. The shots came back and with it the runs.

De Kock’s assurance at one end of the wicket negated the failures of Rohit (14) and Suryakumar Yadav (16). All-rounder Krunal Pandya, who could bowl just one over on Thursday and conceded 12 runs, came good with the bat making a 26-ball 39.

Contrast in bowling

There was hope for Rajasthan with Mumbai needing 25 runs off the last 18. But hope without resources seldom materialises. Rajasthan simply did not have the bowlers who could defend those runs in the death.

“Mr Expensive” Chris Morris, bowling the 18th over gave away 16. Then Bangladeshi pacer Mustafizur Rahman conceded 9 off the first three balls of the 19th over to give Mumbai a victory with nine balls to spare.

Rajasthan’s makeshift bowling attack without Jofra Archer lacks bite. They don’t even have a good spinner, relying on Rahul Tewatia to produce match-winning performances with ball is fanciful.

Contrast that to Mumbai’s attack that has an ever-improving leg-spinner Rahul Chahar (2/33) and two brilliant death bowlers in Jasprit Bumrah (1/15) and Trent Boult (1/37), who deliver yorkers at will.