Rohit Sharma was a disappointed captain after Mumbai Indians lost their fifth consecutive match of IPL 2022. Chasing 199, MI were cruising along but Punjab Kings secured a thrilling 12-run victory when Odeon Smith redeemed himself to take 3 wickets in the final. Above.
Mumbai Indians became the first team to lose twice in the first five matches of the IPL season after a heart-wrenching defeat at the MCA Stadium in Pune.
Rohit Sharma was gutted by two run outs, leaving MI in the chase. At the end of the 11th over, five-time champion Dewald Brevis reached 116 for 3 with 49 off 25 balls. Tilak Verma had also done his bit to keep MI in the hunt with a 20-ball 36 while Suryakumar Yadav played a quickfire 43 to keep PBKS on their toes. However, Suryakumar was involved in a mix-up with Tilak Verma and Kieron Pollard before losing his own wicket in the 19th over.
IPL 2022: full coverage , Mark sheet
Rohit said that he could not pick any fault in a match that he felt he should have won, but regretted that his team could not hold their nerves after coming so close.
Rohit told the host broadcasters after the match, “Hardly to tell from that game. I thought we played the game very well, came pretty close to the back end of our batting innings.”
“It’s just that some important runouts weren’t required, but it happens. At one stage we were running as well as maintaining the run rate, but in the end we couldn’t hold our nerves. To the Kings Credit the way he bowled at the back end.”
‘nothing is working’
Mumbai Indians surprised by sending Tilak Verma ahead of the more experienced Suryakumar Yadav at a crucial juncture in the chase, but Rohit Sharma defended the move.
“If you’re not winning the game, you have to try to find a way to be successful as a team, as a batting group. So we’re trying to find different ideas, different thought processes. It doesn’t seem like working at the moment but I don’t want to take anything from people. We fought a great fight.
“We batted brilliantly, but he held his nerves very well, Kings, and they won the game. We haven’t been playing good cricket for a while and so we are on the losing side, which is simple. Kings have done a lot. Batted well and put pressure on our bowlers, opening partnership of 90-100 runs.
But I thought 190-plus could have been chased on that pitch because that pitch was really good to bat on as you saw when we were batting too. We just have to go back and see what we do as a team.”
Mumbai Indians will next face Lucknow Super Giants at the Wankhede Stadium on Saturday.
Read also | IPL 2022: Don’t understand why Umesh wouldn’t do well for India: KKR’s Tim Southee
Read also | MI vs PBKS: Rohit Sharma joins Virat Kohli in elite 10000-run club in T20s