Win at Last

Streams of people were headed towards the gate. The crowd had realized it wasn’t going to be a dream day for Kolkata. Mumbai Indians, four successive losses, without Harbhajan Singh and Sachin Tendulkar, were finally tasting a win. The Mumbai team’s first century partnership did the trick and Robin Uthappa and Dwayne Bravo were the heroes.

But it wasn’t all rosy for the Indians after they had lost both the openers – Ajinkya Rahane (4) and Sanath Jayasuriya (18) – and Manish Pandey (0) with the scoreboard reading 25.

One just wondered what did the Mumbai team, after a brilliant bowling performance, require to pull off a win. Bravo and Uthappa had a 113-run answer, which not only propelled Mumbai to a win but in the process the two also upstaged Rohit Sharma and Andrew Symonds’s 111-run partnership against Rajasthan for the IPL record for fourth-wicket stand.

Bravo’s elegant drives and back-foot punches were a treat for cricket connoisseurs but silenced the Kolkata crowd.

Second in a row

Kolkata, on the other hand, tasted their second defeat in a row. Not exactly expected after they had a dream start to the tournament with a 140-run win over Bangalore Royal Challengers.

Earlier, Kolkata captain Sourav Ganguly had won the toss and decided to bat first. After Indians captain Shaun Pollock bowled his first over, the decision seemed to be the wrong one. The South African had sent back Brendon McCullum (1) and Ganguly (4) back into the dug-out within the first five balls of the match itself.

After Pollock was done, it was Sanath Jayasuriya’s turn to get some wickets.

He scalped three wickets, that of David Hussey, Mohammad Hafeez and Ajit Agarkar.

While Hussey and Agarkar walked back after having Ashish Nehra catch them in the deep, Hafeez edged one to wicket-keeper Pinal Shah.

Jayasuriya ended with much-more-than-impressive figures of 4-1-14-3.

But one man, who would like to forget the Indian Premier League would be Ricky Ponting. The Australian captain had a grouse about the IPL since the beginning, thanks to the lowly $400,000 that he fetched in the bidding process.

Ponting’s blues

Monday only added to his blues. The man, who played his last IPL match for the season before he returns for a tour to Caribbean, has only scored 39 runs from his four matches. Even his strike-rate (73.58) wasn’t Twenty20-esque.

What must have pained him even more was that though he was middling the ball well, his end had to come in the avatar of a run out. A mix-up with Hafeez meant Ajinkya Rahane had the ball thrown at Jayasuriya at the non-striker’s end and the Sri Lankan, cruelly for Ponting, flicked the bails off.

The only solace for McCullum, who was the other man from the Kolkata team to be playing the last IPL match this season, yesterday was his first-match knock of 158 not out.

That knock not only made the Knight Riders start on a high but even a man called Lalit Modi would have been salivating at the future prospects of the tournament and cash flows.


SCOREBOARD

Kolkata vs Mumbai : Eden gardens, Kolkata

Kolkata knight riders

B McCullum lbw b Pollock (2b) 1
S Ganguly c Jayasuriya b Pollock (2b, 1x4) 4
R Ponting run out (Rahane/Jayasuriya) (31b, 1x4) 19
D Das c Uthappa b Bravo (20b, 5x4, 1x6) 29
D Hussey c Nehra b Jayasuriya (20b, 3x4) 17
Mohammad Hafeez c Shah b Jayasuriya (6b) 2
LR Shukla not out (22b, 4x4, 2x6) 40
A Agarkar c Nehra b Jayasuriya (6b) 2
M Kartik c Jayasuriya b Fernando (11b, 1x4) 10
I Sharma not out (0b) 0

Extras (b 1, lb 5, w 7) 13
Total (8 wickets; 20 overs) 137

Fall of wickets: 1-5 (Ganguly), 2-6 (McCullum), 3-40 (Das), 4-74 (Hussey), 5-77 (Ponting), 6-77 (Mohammad Hafeez), 7-90 (Agarkar), 8-131 (Kartik)

Bowling: Pollock 4-0-27-2, Nehra 1-0-9-0, Fernando 4-0-41-1, Kulkarni 3-0-15-0, Bravo 4-0-25-1, Jayasuriya 4-1-14-3


Mumbai Indians (target 138)

A Rahane c Hussey b Agarkar (10b, 1x4) 4
S Jayasuriya b Sharma (10b, 3x4, 1x6) 18
M Pandey b Dinda (3b) 0
R Uthappa not out (37b, 5x4) 37
D Bravo not out (53b, 8x4, 1x6) 64

Extras (lb-5, w-9, nb-1) 15
Total (3 wickets; 18.4 overs) 138
Fall of wickets: 1-16 (Rahane), 2-25 (Jayasuriya), 3-25 (Pandey)
Bowling: Agarkar 4-0-23-1,Sharma 3.4-0-33-1, Dinda 4-0-12-1, Kartik 3-0-24-0, Hafeez 1-0-16-0, Ganguly 2-0-14-0,Shukla 1-0-11-0