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Images from Sunday's IPL match between Delhi Capitals and Mumbai Indians, Abu Dhabi.
Quinton de Kock and Suryakumar Yadav came up with fluent knocks to guide Mumbai Indians to a five-wicket victory over Delhi Capitals in the Indian Premier League match, in Abu Dhabi on Sunday.
In the battle between two of the most consistent teams in this IPL season, the defending champions, chasing 163, overhauled the target with two balls to spare and claimed the top spot in the points table with five wins from seven matches.
Shikhar Dhawan scored his first half-century of the season and shared a 85-run stand with skipper Shreyas Iyer (42) to help Delhi Capitals post 162 for four. However, the total proved insufficient in the face of some confident batting by Mumbai Indians.
Kieron Pollard (11 not out) and Krunal Pandya (12 not out) took Mumbai home after De Kock and Suryakumar laid the foundation and Ishan Kishan (28 off 15 balls) chipped in with a useful cameo.
De Kock's 53 came off 36 balls, inclusive of three sixes and four shots to the fence, while Suryakumar needed 32 balls for his 53 that was studded with six fours and a six.
After losing Suryakumar and Hardik Pandya (0) in quick succession, Mumbai also lost Kishan towards the end but there was no twist in the tale.
To their credit, Kagiso Rabada (2/28) and Anrich Nortje dragged it to the last over with incisive bowling.
Delhi Capitals’s spin all-rounder Axar Patel, who has made an impact since replacing Amit Mishra, got the big fish when he sent back the dangerous Rohit Sharma just when he was looking to break the shackles.
Rohit was already struggling and it was De Kock, who was doing the bulk of scoring. The South African was in tremendous touch and in no time raised his fifty with a boundary off Harshal Patel.
Suryakumar, who replaced Rohit at the crease, also struck the ball hard and clean from the word go.
However, Ravichandran Ashwin applied checked the momentum by inducing a top-edge from De Kock, who tried a sweep and was caught by Prithvi Shaw at deep square leg.
Suryakumar was watching the ball nicely but did not give enough respect to Rabada and paid the price.
Similarly, young Kishan should have finished off the game himself but lost his wicket by being over aggressive against Rabada.
Earlier, Dhawan gave himself enough time to play the sheet-anchor's role even as the Mumbai Indians bowlers did a decent job in the slog overs to prevent the batsmen from playing too many big shots.
Dhawan's unbeaten 69-run knock came off 52 balls and included six fours and a six, while Iyer's 33-ball 42 had five shots to the fence.
After Prithvi Shaw (4) was snared early by Trent Boult and Ajinkya Rahane followed him back in the dug-out soon, there were no free runs for the Capitals at the start after electing to bat.
Rahane, playing his first game of the season, was trapped in front of the wicket by Krunal Pandya, introduced timely by Mumbai Indians skipper Rohit Sharma, considering that the India Test vice-captain struggles against left-arm spinners.
With the in-form Iyer and Dhawan at the crease, the boundaries were few and far between, but they kept the scoreboard ticking at a decent run-rate.
Iyer's trademark ground-strokes, played with straight bat, were effective and a treat to watch. Dhawan chugged along nicely as the two batsmen formed a substantial partnership.
Krunal broke the stand by getting rid of Iyer, who holed out to Boult at deep mid-wicket.
It brought Marcus Stonis (13) to the crease. The Australian hit two cracking boundaries but was run-out in a mix up with Dhawan.
Rohit smartly used his spinners in the middle overs and kept Jasprit Bumrah's quota for the slog overs.
The spin duo of Krunal (2/26) and Rahul Chahar conceded only 53 runs in their eight overs.