Mumbai, although alive in the playoff race, would be required to win all the six remaining matches in order to finish in the top four
Hardik Pandya and Suryakumar Yadav between the wickets (Pic: AFP)
Yashasvi Jaiswal struck form with an unbeaten 104 as Rajasthan Royals consolidated their position at the top of the IPL table with a nine-wicket thrashing of Mumbai Indians on Monday.
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Medium-pace bowler Sandeep Sharma took 5-18 to help restrict Mumbai to 179-9 after Yuzvendra Chahal claimed an IPL first of 200 wickets at Rajasthan's home ground in Jaipur. Jaiswal, a left-handed opener whose previous best this season was 39, steered the team home in 18.4 overs in an innings interrupted by rain.
Rajasthan, who won the inaugural IPL in 2008 under late Australian hero Shane Warne, registered their seventh win in eight matches Jaiswal struck his second IPL hundred - both versus Mumbai -- as he smashed nine fours and seven sixes in his 60-ball knock and put on 109 runs with skipper Sanju Samson, who made 38.
Sharma set up victory his first ever five-wicket haul in T20 cricket as he took the spotlight away from Chahal's remarkable feat and was named man of the match. Chahal sent back Mohammad Nabi caught and bowled for 23 with his leg-spin as he celebrated the achievement with hugs from teammates. But Chahal was taken for 48 runs in four overs and Sharma stood out after he took three wickets in the 20th over including Tilak Varma, who top-scored with 65, and Tim David, who made three.
Chahal was substituted with Jos Buttler coming in as impact player and he began with two boundaries in the opening over by skipper Hardik Pandya, who played his landmark 100th IPL match. Pandya has endured a tough time this season after he replaced veteran Rohit Sharma as skipper only to be booed by the fans across venues.
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The left-handed Jaiswal joined in the charge as he hit South African speedster Gerald Coetzee for a six and two fours to get the chase underway. Rajasthan raced to 61-0 in six overs when rain stopped play and action resumed after 45 minutes. Piyush Chawla bowled Buttler for 35 after the break but Jaiswal stood firm and in the company of Samson made the chase a cakewalk.
Mumbai, although alive in the playoff race, would be required to win all the six remaining matches in order to finish in the top four. While winning all of them is not impossible, one can't rule out the contrary.
Remaining matches:
vs Delhi Capitals - April 27, Saturday - 3:30 PM IST (Arun Jaitley Stadium)
vs Lucknow Super Giants - April 30, Tuesday - 7:30 PM IST (Ekana Stadium)
vs Kolkata Knight Riders - May 3, Friday - 7:30 PM IST (Wankhede Stadium)
vs Sunrisers Hyderabad - May 6, Monday - 7:30 PM IST (Wankhede Stadium)
vs Kolkata Knight Riders - May 11, Saturday - 7:30 PM IST (Eden Gardens)
vs Lucknow Super Giants - May 17, Friday - 7:30 PM IST (Wankhede Stadium)
As it turns out, the side will play three of their remaining league stage matches at home, however they are to face SRH, by whom they have had been beaten by a huge margin not so long ago. Mumbai are scheduled to play LSG and KKR twice over the course of the next few weeks. Having beaten Delhi in the past, Pandya's Blue Brigade will hope to make it two out of two in pursuit of a top-four finish. Having said that, both KKR and LSG could be tricky opponents and will each need to win at least five of their six remaining games to reach the playoffs.
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