Virat Kohli does not need us, we need him: Bumrah
Bumrah, however, stressed that Kohli knows his cricket better than anyone else and that his experience of batting in these challenging conditions was essential from the team’s perspective.
A hat-trick by Samuel Badree (4/9) and Virat Kohli’s knock of 62 runs went in vain as Royal Challengers Bangalore lost a nail-biting IPL 2017 match to Mumbai Indians on Friday.
West Indies’ batsman Kieron Pollard scored impressive 70 runs off 47 balls to help Mumbai register a four-wicket win at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bengaluru.
Chasing a small target of 143 runs, Mumbai started miserably as they lost four of their batsmen for just seven runs inside first three overs.
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However, Kieron Pollard brought the match close after scoring a 70-run knock at a strike rate of 148.93.
At lower middle-order, Pollard put 93-run partnership stand with Krunal Pandya (37*) for the sixth-wicket.
Hardik Pandya scored swift nine runs that include a winning six as well.
Earlier, Badree led havoc on struggling Mumbai as he claimed four wickets in the shape of Parthiv Patel (3), Rohit Sharma (0), Mitchell McClenaghan (0) and Nitish Rana (11) in his four-over illustrious spell.
Fast bowler Stuart Binny dismissed Jos Buttler for two runs to help Badree, taking the grip of the match early.
Spinner Yuzvendra Chahal took the much valued wicket of Pollard, though it couldn’t help him team much as the West Indian had already given MI a boost.
In RCB’s innings, captain Kohli was the lone warrior as he scored 62 runs to put 142 runs on scoreboard for the loss of five wickets.
The 28-year-old batsman hit five boundaries and two sixes in his 37-ball knock to lift the Bengaluru crowd off their feet.
Explosive batsmen Chris Gayle and AB de Villiers failed to shoulder responsibility as they managed to hit just 22 runs and 19 runs respectively.
In the middle-order, Kedar Jadhav was run out for nine runs, while Mandeep Singh went back to pavilion for a duck.
New Zealand pacer Mitchell McClenaghan led Mumbai’s pace attack as he claimed two wickets in the shape of Kohli and Mandeep.
McClenaghan trapped the big fish – Kohli with a good length delivery that was lofted by the Indian batsman at deep extra cover, where Jos Buttler made no mistake.
Hardik took the scalp of Gayle, earning the breakthrough for Mumbai in the 10th over.
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