IPL 2017 | Nitish Rana and Hardik Pandya secure unlikely MI win over KKR

Brief scores :  Mumbai Indians 180/6 (Nitish Rana 50*, Parthiv Patel 30; Ankit Rajpoot 3/37, Sunil Narine 1/22) beat Kolkata Knight Riders 178/7 (Manish Pandey 81*, Chris Lynn 31; Krunal Pandya 3/24, Lasith Malinga 2/36) by 4 wickets.

Winning the toss, Mumbai Indians, unsurprisingly, chose the safest route in T20s - bowl first. While Mumbai brought back their spearhead Lasith Malinga and veteran Harbhajan Singh, KKR, sacrificed Piyush Chawla to bring pacer Ankit Rajpoot to play a pivotal role on the pacy Wankhede track. 

Krunal Pandya justifies his selection

Making use of the good surface on offer, Kolkata made a good start to their innings - courtesy a 44-run opening stand, in just four overs, between Gautam Gambhir and Chris Lynn - before the former miscued a shot to square-leg, on a Krunal Pandya delivery. Despite getting off the mark with a cheeky shot to the fine third-man boundary, Uthappa perished on the next delivery. After the wicket-keeper’s dismissal, the star of the first game, Lynn couldn’t recreate his magic as he was caught plumb in front of his stumps by a perfect Bumrah yorker leaving Kolkata reeling at 67 for 3 after 7.3 overs. The hosts continued piling on the pressure with Krunal Pandya picking up the wicket of Yusuf Pathan and restricted the visitor to just 79 off the first 10 overs.

After Pandya, Pandey lights up the Mumbai cauldron

The early wickets, however, had little impact on Manish Pandey, who batted with a lot of composure and ensured that Mumbai didn’t squeeze Kolkata with spin after the top-order collapse. Partnering Suryakumar Yadav, Pandey got off the blocks after suffering a scratchy start and the duo associated for a 44-run fifth wicket stand before Yadav was caught out by a slower Lasith Malinga delivery. Pandey, however, was holding his ground as he notched up his fifty off 37 balls. Despite losing partners at the other end, Pandey continued with his impressive display and scoring 33 of the 42 runs the Knight Riders managed in the last three overs to finish their innings at 178 for 7.

Mumbai collapse after solid opening start

Mumbai’s opening pair of Parthiv Patel and Jos Buttler got the chase off to a good start with a 65-run stand with Buttler playing the aggressor among the duo, constantly making room and smearing boundaries while Patel played the second fiddle. But after getting a good start, Patel failed to understand Kuldeep Yadav’s wrong ‘un and was trapped LBW for 30. He was soon followed by Buttler, who perished to Ankit Rajpoot’s slower ball for 28. To add to their misery, skipper Rohit Sharma was wrongly given LBW when there was a big edge involved. With the required run-rate climbing, Nitish Rana and Krunal Pandya had to dig in deep there to make an impact. 

Rana, Pandya pull off the unbelievable

But when luck lady is not on your side, then nobody can save you from facing the brunt and that was the case with Mumbai as just a couple of overs later, Krunal Pandya found himself at the wrong end of another umpiring gaffe. Despite the ball not having made any connection with his bat, he was ruled caught behind for 11. While Pollard was left searching for answers, there was little hope for the others. But after the West Indian departed for 17, Rana tried to make a game out of it and in the penultimate over, he hit Ankit Rajpoot for a six and four before getting out. But Hardik Pandya hit 29 runs off just 11 balls to take Mumbai to their first victory of the tournament with 1 ball to spare.