Who won yesterday's IPL match? Punjab Kings (PBKS) hosted Mumbai Indian (MI) at the Maharaja Yadavindra Singh International Cricket Stadium in Mullanpur, Chandigarh on Thursday (April 18) in match 33 of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024. (As It Happened | Scorecard)
Punjab Kings' stand-in captain Sam Curran won the toss and invited Mumbai Indians to bat first on a tricky pitch which assisted spinners unlike its natural behaviour. Mumbai Indians started well but Kagiso Rabada got the first breakthrough on the first delivery of his over. He dismissed Ishan Kishan who holed out at the deep point.
Suryakumar Yadav continued his good form and kept hitting boundaries at regular intervals with the former captain Rohit Sharma. However, Sharma never looked settled and finally got dismissed by Sam Curran in the 12th over after making 36 off 25 balls.
Advertisement
Yadav batted well and completed his second half-century of the season in 34 balls. This was his 23rd IPL fifty. He pulled the shorter delivery of Harshal Patel to mid-wicket for a single to reach the milestone.
Tilak Varma tried to rebuild innings with Yadav but the run rate dropped in between overs and to increase that, Yadav lost his wickets after making 78 runs off 53 balls. Captain Hardik Pandya started with a six but couldn't spend much time on the crease.
Tim David and Varma displayed some aerial shots but the pitch was not easy to bat on. Curran conceded 18 runs in the 19th over but Harshal Patel's brilliant bowling in the final over restricted PBKS to 192/7 in 20 overs.
Advertisement
Punjab Kings started the chase on a positive note as Sam Curran, who came to open the innings with Prabhsimran Singh, played a beautiful cover drive to open the run account of the Kings. But Gerald Coetzee struck back on the third delivery and got Prabhsimran dismissed by a caught behind.
Rilee Rossouw was sent back by Jasprit Bumrah with a brilliant yorker. He also got Curran caught behind in the same over. Liam Livingstone was caught & bowled by Gerald Coetzee on the first delivery of the next over pushing PBKS further down.
Harpreet Bhatia and Shashank Singh played some shots but Shreyas Gopal's brilliant catch in the follow-through ended Bhatia's inning. Ashutosh Sharma and Singh held the gates for some time and the chase looked easier but Bumrah got rid of Shashank with a slower delivery.
Ashutosh Sharma fought the lone war from there and added 57 runs for the eighth wicket with Harpreet Brar. Sharma almost snatched the victory from MI's grab but lost his wicket while trying for another aerial shot in the 18th over. Brar and Kagiso Rabada kept the hopes alive with some shots but in the end, Punjab Kings remained nine runs short of the target as they lost all of their wickets with five balls to spare.
Advertisement
Bumrah was awarded the Player of the Match for his brilliant bowling figure of 4-0-21-3. With this win, MI climbed to number seven on the points table whereas Punjab Kings slipped to ninth position.
