Mumbai Indians Dominate SRH with Suryakumar’s 102* and Hardik-Chawla’s Bowling
Mumbai Indians dominated Sunrisers Hyderabad with an impressive win, thanks to Suryakumar Yadav’s unbeaten 102 off 51 balls, complemented by stellar bowling performances from Hardik Pandya and Piyush Chawla.
Sunrisers Hyderabad was limited to 173 by Hardik and Chawla, who each claimed three wickets, before Suryakumar and Tilak completed the chase.
Sunrisers Hyderabad 173 for 8 (Head 48, Cummins 35*, Hardik 3-31, Chawla 3-33) lost to Mumbai Indians 174 for 3 (Suryakumar 102*, Tilak 37, Bhuvneshwar 1-22) by seven wickets.
Suryakumar Yadav’s incredible unbroken 102 off 51 balls, combined with three wicket hauls from Hardik Pandya and Piyush Chawla, gave the Mumbai Indians (MI) their fourth season victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) by seven wickets in Mumbai. MI moved up to ninth place in the table as a result of the victory.
SRH was scheduled to visit Wankhede Stadium, promising a run-fest. Who would have doubted this given that records were altered following the previous conflict between SRH and MI. Rather, as SRH was limited to 173 for 8, the MI bowlers took center stage. The SRH bowlers responded by moving the new ball around and picking up three powerplay wickets.
To put things right again, though, Suryakumar chose to do his trademark Suryakumar thing and attacked the SRH bowlers, especially Marco Jansen. alongside 37 not out off 32 and 143 off 79 balls alongside Suryakumar, Tilak Varma was the ideal foil, helping MI win in 17.2 overs.
Chaotic Turn of Event for SRH
Going into this game, chasing 174 did not seem like a difficult task, especially at a place where totals above 180 had been hit in six of the ten innings this season. However, the SRH bowlers made life very difficult for the batsmen. There was plenty of seam and swing available, and the bowlers at first even had trouble controlling the swing. After they discovered their lengths, they bowled 18 extras in the first three overs, but batting became difficult. The batting team was repeatedly defeated, the ball shot off the pitch, and wickets began to tumble.
The length of the Test match was what caused the SRH to quickly take wickets. Ishan Kishan was only able to edge Jansen’s seaming delivery to first slip in the opening exchange. And how can Pat Cummins stay out of the picture when we’re talking about Test-match length? With a massive top edge, Cummins bowled a wicket-maiden in the opening over that left Rohit Sharma out of the game. Naman Dhir was subsequently caught by Bhuvneshwar Kumar for a nine-ball duck, flashing to first slip.
With MI all over the place, not a single run was scored off the bat between overs 1.3 and 4.4.
Head Started Explosively Though
For MI, it was a bizarre game of powerplay with the ball. While they didn’t bowl poorly, they didn’t have much luck. Travis Head opened the scoring in the opening over against Nuwan Thushara with an inside-edged four, and he added another in the second over against Anshul Kamboj, who was making his debut. When Head’s off stump fell on the ground in the next over, Kamboj ought to have taken his first IPL wicket, but he overreached. Head eventually took him for 19 in the over, and SRH were out of the match.
Abhishek Sharma was dismissed by Jasprit Bumrah after he was found behind for 11 off 16, but SRH was still able to score 56 for 1 on the powerplay. MI would have been annoyed that despite drawing 18 incorrect shots in the opening six overs, they managed to claim just one wicket.
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Hardik and Chawla Turned the Match
In the eighth over, Kamboj had another opportunity to remove Head, but Thushara was unable to hold on to a rather straightforward chance at deep third. The 23-year-old Kamboj was ultimately rewarded for his good fortune when Mayank Agarwal was dismissed by a bail-trimmer. The Chawla and Hardik show was on it.
After ten overs, SRH were comfortably positioned at 88 for 2, but Chawla turned the tide by picking up Head for a 30-ball 48. After a slog sweep that was straight to deep backward square leg, Nitish Reddy was removed by Hardik, who used a short ball that was spooned straight up. Heinrich Klassen was then playing for Chawla as SRH fell from 90 for 2 to 96 for 5 in 11 balls.
Shahbaz Ahmed and Jansen held out for a little while, but Hardik had them back in the 16th over as SRH was at 125 for 7 and soon after that at 136 for 8, with Chawla snaring Abdul Samad. Thanks to Cummins’ undefeated 17-ball 35, SRH was able to even surpass the 170-run threshold.
It eventually ran out of steam.
Surya Show on a Tricky Wankhede Wicket
Nine runs were scored in three overs when Suryakumar declared that enough was enough. He faced Cummins first, then saved special attention for Jansen. Overs six and seven yielded a combined 38 runs, as he went 4, 4, 6 in the seventh over before smashing Jansen over fine leg for a flat six. In a flash, Suryakumar went from 4 off 7 to 32 off 14, negating any early momentum that SRH had.
Tilak performed flawlessly in the role of second fiddle as Suryakumar continued. Suryakumar hit his fifty off of thirty balls after smashing Jansen for 32 runs off nine balls, including two sixes and four fours.
When Suryakumar was seen hobbling for a while, there were worried looks in the MI dugout, as well as among those who were likely interested in India’s chances in the T20 World Cup next month. However, the big hits continued. Following a long-on mowing of a slower ball by Bhuvneshwar, Shahbaz Ahmed was swept twice in two balls. Then, in the 17th over, Suryakumar quickly went from 82 to 96 in three balls, scoring 4, 4, 6. Then, needing six to win and four for his century, he withdrew and finished the job by going inside out over T Natarajan’s covers.
In T20 cricket, this was Suryakumar’s sixth century and his second in the IPL.
