Mumbai's Lasinth Malinga leaves Hyderabad Sunrisers mesmerised

Sport360 staff 03:51 26/04/2015
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  • On the money: Malinga picked up 4-23.

    It was a match that Mumbai Indians would have hated to lose. Watched by 17,000-odd kids from underprivileged backgrounds, who transformed the Wankhede Stadium into a sea of deep blue dressed in team colours, Rohit Sharma and his men ensured they went home a happy lot by beating Sunrisers Hyderabad by 20 runs.

    The children, brought in by various charity organisations, saw their heroes put up a less-than-impressive total of 157 for eight, and they looked set for a rout as Hyderabad got off to a quick start.

    But once the openers Shikhar Dhawan and David Warner were dismissed, the rest of the batting did not put up much of a fight and finished on 137 for eight.

    Dhawan looked in brilliant touch as he raced to 42 runs in 29 balls, which included 18 runs in Harbhajan Singh’s second over.

    But Lasith Malinga dismissed Warner (nine off seven balls) in the next over, and then was in the thick of things once again as he took a sharp catch to get rid of Dhawan off left-arm quick Mitchell McClenaghan.

    From 52-1 in the sixth over, Hyderabad were pegged back by Malinga (4-23) and McClenaghan (3-20).

    Ravi Bopara (23 from 27 balls) and Lokesh Rahul (25 off 27) tried to fight back, but runs and boundaries had dried up for them.

    Between the seventh and 12th overs, Mumbai gave away just 29 runs and did not concede a single boundary. And then Man-of-the-Match Malinga returned for a sensational 19th over and put the issue beyond doubt when he took three wickets in his first four balls.

    With the first ball, he induced an edge from Hanuma Vihari to wicket-keeper Parthiv Patel. Praveen Kumar survived his first ball and was clean bowled with the second when he could not connect and missed a slower delivery, and it was three in four balls when Dale Steyn miscued a pull into the safe hands of Kieron Pollard.

    Earlier, Sunrisers’ pace attack struck regularly and restricted the Mumbai batsmen to a below-par score. Bhuvneshwar Kumar (3-26), Steyn (2-38) and Kumar (2-35) were all on target. 

    The Indians could not capitalise on the start provided by openers Lendl Simmons (51 in 42 balls) and Parthiv Patel (17 in 17), who added 42 runs in 5.3 overs.

    Pollard (33 in 24 balls) provided the late flourish as Mumbai added 49 runs in the last six overs to finish on 157 for eight.

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