The Delhi Capitals seem to have got off the train that they had boarded at the start of the Indian Premier League 2020. From being rated as the best team in the tournament, now they have lost four in a row and the problem is that all those four losses have been one dimensional in which the Capitals have just gone off the radar and lost in a big way.
In this game too, the match went in the same way as after losing the toss in Dubai, the Delhi Capitals kept on losing wickets at the continuous intervals and no batsman could settle in. Bundled out for just 111, there was no chance for the Capitals to comeback. And even if they would have harboured any hope, it was all washed away by the Ishan Kishan show in which he scored 72 off 47 balls. In the bowling department, Trent Boult and Jasprit Bumrah did what they are known for, pick wickets.
Captains’ Viewpoints
Reacting to the victory, Kieron Pollard the winning captain looked in a seemed in a jovial mood as he counted wins for Mumbai Indians under his captaincy. “It's 16 (wins for me as captain) off 17 (matches),” he said.
Talking about the strategy of rotating the bowlers, Pollard said that Bumrah wanted to bowl in the powerplays but he held him back as spinners were getting a good grip on the wicket. “Bumrah with the new ball, I kept delaying him, and in this kind of track, it was more useful to bowl him in the middle. He kept looking at me and wanted to bowl in the powerplay. We wanted to bowl spinners in the powerplay with some grip on offer,” said the 32-year-old.
Impressed by how Ishan Kishan has changed since being asked to open after the Rohit Sharma injury, Pollard said, “Ishan has gotten better in every game, and once he gets going, he's hard to get rid of. He didn't even start, Ishan, in the playing XI, came to No. 4 and then came out to open and just blew us away.”
“Rohit is getting better and hopefully he'll be back soon. We need to play another couple of good games and get to the finals,” the West Indian updated on the injury of the regular captain.
Just as he started the post-match chat, the Trinidadian remained jolly as he ended it with a statement that might just give a burn to the fans of the rest of the teams. “This isn't supposed to be our year (even number), but it's been working for us so far,” Pollard concluded.
Shreyas Iyer, warming the losing captains’ chair for quite some time now, looked disappointed at the loss. “Obviously, we fell short of reading the wicket. We weren't up to the mark right from the start and those wickets in the Powerplay took down the momentum from us,” said the Delhi skipper.
Lamenting the fact they were not able to build momentum, he said, “It was important for a few us to come and build a few partnerships but it happened in bits and pieces.” He then admitted about the flaws of the team saying, “There are lots of flaws to be pointed out to, but we gotta believe in ourselves and be strong-headed, also be positive.”
The 25-year-old seemed as perplexed by the behaviour of pitches over the course of time as those sitting outside. He said, “You can't anticipate how it's (the pitch) going to play right from the start.”
Expecting openers to give the team a good start, Iyer said, “Openers being there, it was important to get a good start, once you get the momentum, you can build on later. I feel 150 or 160 was a good total on such wickets.”
Talking about the plan for the last game, he said that most of the things would depend upon the result of the SRH vs RCB match. “We'll have to think about it (changes to the line-up) and be fearless in our approach. We'll keep things simple and will not try to think much. It's going to be doing or die for both teams (about the next game) depending on how RCB play tonight,” Iyer concluded.
Expert Opinion
Experts targeted Delhi Capitals for failing consistently saying that they have been foxed many times in the recent games, mainly because they haven’t applied themselves according to the situation of the game.
Veteran journalist Ayaz Memon said that the Delhi team is falling away and needs to shape up quickly if they don't want to fall out of the title race.
