Indian Premier League- Mumbai vs Delhi

The 28^th match of IPL 2013 was an interesting one. Delhi went in to this match having lost all seven of their matches this season, and Mumbai have had a good season so far but their big name players like Ricky Ponting and Sachin Tendulkar have failed to perform.

Mumbai won the toss and decided to bat first on a hot Sunday afternoon in Delhi. Interestingly the yet-to-fire Ricky Ponting demoted himself down the order and Sachin Tendulkar opened the batting with the West Indian Dwayne Smith. Some good opening bowling by Irfan Pathan and Shahbaz Nadeem from Delhi saw a slow start from Mumbai but sensible batting from Tendulkar (54 from 47 balls) and big hitting from Rohit Sharma (73 from 43 balls) resulted in a crucial partnership.. Along with the partnership, and a combination of poor death bowling from Delhi lead Mumbai to a good total of 161.

Despite the good total from Mumbai, they couldn’t back up with the ball with a poor bowling and fielding effort. Every bowler was punished by Delhi’s opening combination of Mahela Jayawardene and Virender Sehwag. The only Mumbai bowler that was good was the ever consistent fast bowler from Sri Lanka, Lasith Malinga, who took one wicket at an economical 6.50 runs per over. Delhi raced to the total in 17 overs with Virender Sehwag starring (95 from 57 balls) backed up by his opening partner, Mahela Jayawardene (59 from 43 balls). 
Scorecard

By Kailaesh Raveendran