Chennai, May 6
Rohit Sharma’s barren run with the bat continued as Chennai Super Kings broke a 13-year-old home jinx against Mumbai Indians with an easy six-wicket victory in their IPL match here today.
16 It was Rohit Sharma’s 16th duck in the IPL, the most for any batter in the history of the competition. He has surpassed Dinesh Karthik, Mandeep Singh and Sunil Narine, who are now joint second with 15 ducks each.
The Indian skipper’s horrid run in the IPL continued as he failed to score for the second match in a row as Mumbai scored a below-par 139/8 against Chennai. The hosts’ pace and seam troika of Deepak Chahar (2/18), Man of the Match Matheesha Pathirana (3/15) and Tushar Deshpande (2/25) was too hot to handle for the visitors.
The chase was a cakewalk as Devon Conway (44 off 42 balls) played the role of an anchor to perfection after Ruturaj Gaikwad’s whirlwind 16-ball 30. The win was completed in 17.5 overs as Chennai leapt up to second place behind Gujarat Titans in the points table.
Skipper Mahendra Singh Dhoni scored the winning runs, much to the delight of the adoring crowd at Chepauk. The last time Chennai won against Mumbai at Chepauk was in 2010.
Mumbai stay in the sixth place with 10 points from as many games and have to raise their game significantly if they are to make the playoffs. What will certainly worry Mumbai is their skipper’s prolonged lean patch. He has managed only 184 runs from 10 games, with five scores of less than 10 and only two scores above 40 to his name.
Brief scores: MI: 139/8 in 20 overs (Wadhera 64; Pathirana 3/15, Chahar 2/18, Deshpande 2/26); CSK: 140/4 in 17.4 overs (Conway 44, Gaikwad 30; Chawla 2/25). — PTI
A tale of two brothers as GT meet LSG
Ahmedabad: It will be a test of wits between the Pandya brothers when defending champions Gujarat Titans clash with Lucknow Super Giants in the IPL here tomorrow. Under Hardik Pandya, Gujarat are leading the standings with 14 points. Krunal, on the other hand, led Lucknow in the washed out match against Chennai Super Kings. He will be tasked with raising the morale of the side, which will be missing key players. He will be tasked with raising the morale of the side, which will be missing key players.