New Delhi: Chennai Super Kings execute a comfortable chase against arch-rivals Mumbai Indians at Chepauk. A top-order collapse restricted MI to 139 despite Nehal Wadhera’s heroics and CSK chased the score with balls 14 remaining. Ruturaj Gaikwad’s 30 off 16 set the tone and Devon Conway led the anchor role to nearly finish the chase.
Super Kings had a good start and it looked a different pitch as Gaikwad destroyed the bowlers in the powerplay. Devon Conway scored 44 off 42 while Ajinkya Rahane and Shivam Dube scored runs around him in the middle overs. Rahane scored 23 off 17 while Dube added 26* off 18 with three maximums to his name.
While Jofra Archer controlled runs and Piyush Chawla continued his form picking up two wickets, MI did not have many runs to save the game. Gaikwad scored 20 runs against Arshad Khan in the third over, which was one-seventh of the total chase.
In the first inning, after Tushar Deshpande dismissed Cameron Green early, Deepak Chahar came back into form and struck twice with the new ball to dismiss Ishan Kishan and Rohit Sharma in a single over. Nehal Wadhera scored 64 off 51 and showed that the pitch was fine for batting. Apart from Wadhera, MI’s inning was a total collapse with Suryakumar Yadav as the next-best scorer with 26 off 22.
Wadhera and SKY had a small partnership before Ravindra Jadeja continued his love affair with Chepauk and bowled Suryakumar. It was Matheesha Pathirana who picked up three wickets in the death, including hitting Wadhera’s stumps with a great yorker. Losing wickets at the top and in the death overs gave momentum to CSK, which used it in the right way.
Pathirana ended up with the figures of 15/3 while Deepak Chahar finished with 18/2 in his three overs. Purple Cap holder Tushar Deshpande, who was criticised for his economy, went for 26/2 in four overs.
Mumbai Indians had some unusual decisions of placing Rohit at number 3 and not including in-form Tilak Varma. They had Tristan Stubbs instead, who picked a wicket but did not have a similar impact with the bat.
