An upbeat Royal Challengers Bangalore beat a struggling Mumbai Indians by seven wickets in match 18 of Indian Premier League 2022.
Batting first, the Mumbai Indians struggled to score runs against a solid RCB bowling line-up. Openers Ishan Kishan and Rohit Sharma scored 26 runs each, while Suryakumar Yadav remained unbeaten on 68 runs. Tilak Verma and Kieron Pollard were dismissed for a duck, Dewald Brevis and Ramandeep Singh scored in single digits.
Harshal Patel and Wanindu Hasaranga picked up two wickets each while Akash Deep chipped in with one.
Chasing 152, RCB wrapped up the game in 18.3 overs. Anuj Rawat top-scored with a knock of 66, while Virat Kohli missed a half-century by just two runs.
“Just the combination that we felt would be ideal on certain pitches and certain opposition. We wanted to strengthen our batting, unfortunately, we had few overseas guys who were unavailable, so we wanted to get the best from whatever we had. Just got 26, I wanted to bat as long as possible, but unfortunately, I got out at the wrong time,” said captain Sharma in a post-match presentation.
Mumbai have now lost four matches on a trot and another two losses could potentially make their chances of qualifying for the playoffs too little.
Image credit: IPL