The Mumbai Indians are having a season to forget this year in the TATA IPL 2022 season as the team has not been able to win a single game after a total of seven games. This is the first time an IPL team has had to go through this kind of form as well.
They stay at the bottom of the table with 0 points on board after MS Dhoni managed to keep his composure and steer his Chennai team to victory by scoring a boundary on the very last ball of the match. The thrilling match would have felt like a disappointment for the Mumbai Indians who were so close to get their maiden win of the season.
After managing to put a below par 155 on the board for Mumbai, the new looking Mumbai bowling contingent which had the likes of Riley Meredith, Daniel Sams and off-spinner Hrithik Shokeen, frustrated Chennai batting lineup by taking taking wickets at regular intervals. However, Dwaine Pretorius’ 14-ball 22 and Dhoni’s (28 off 13 balls) world class batting skills which took the match away from them was enough to keep Mumbai winless in IPL 2022.
Head coach Mahela Jayawardene, had some things to say in his post-match virtual press conference and felt that his side have been lacking the instincts to finish off certain matches successfully.
“It is a tough loss (to take), the guys fought really well. We just need that instinct to finish games off but we are making mistakes. We knew the wicket was tough, so we had to get through the first six overs and set up a par score. The bowlers bowled brilliantly, executed the plans,” he said.
Mumbai pacer Jaydev Unadkat was given the target of 17 runs to defend in his final over. He started off with dismissing Pretorius on his first ball for LBW but later on lost his focus and got hit by the incredible MS Dhoni for three boundaries which consisted of a last ball four to win the game for the Chennai Super Kings on the night.
“But in the end, the experience of MS closed the game for them. We need to get over these small margins. Last few games, we had our opportunities missed. So, we just need to keep fighting, that’s the message to the team. They understand that but they need to try and execute it out in the middle,” said Jayawardene.
Mumbai Indians’ bowling contingent saw Sam Billings impress after giving average performances in the recent games and had a spell of 4/30 with an economy rate of 7.5 in his four overs. Sam’s fellow Australian teammate Riley Meredith also came up with an impressive bowling display of 1/25, with an economy rate of 6.2. Jayawardene also talked about why Meredith was not able to perform to his best potential and hence, wasn’t a regular starter early on in the tournament.
“Riley came to us with after a side strain, without playing much cricket or without bowling much. So it was a gradual build up for Riley and wanted to make sure that he had a lot of bowling in before he could go out. There was a lot of skill work done and probably he could have played the last game in last week or so.”
But we had other guys playing and didn’t want to chop and change as well and wanted to keep some consistency going. But we felt that he was fine now and that he had the overs under him as well as the confidence. I’m pretty happy with his bowling, bowled in good areas and he used his variations well today. Hopefully, we get to use him going forward,” Mahela Jayawardene further added.
Mumbai’s seventh consecutive defeat in the TATA IPL 2022 has again showcased the Mumbai team’s ineffectiveness in closing out the games after being good in patches.
(Inputs from IANS)