IPL 2018, Match 31, RCB vs MI - Who Said What

Virat Kohli could was finally celebrate his brilliant effort on the field and walked back smiling as his team Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) defended a not so huge 167 against Mumbai Indians (MI). The fans were still there in the stands, despite the results not going their way they still backed the team and they finally had a reason to celebrate. At the halfway stage MI would’ve believed the game was well within reach but it was not and they lost by 14 runs.

In the entire first innings, two overs made a lot of difference, it was the 18th over from Hardik Pandya where he fetched three wickets, was on a hat-trick at one point and the 20th where Colin de Grandhomme smashed Mitchell McClenaghan for 24 that defined the innings. As it turns out at 19 overs MI also needed as many runs but their match-winners were back in the pavilion.

It was a masterstroke to promote Manan Vohra up the order for RCB and Rohit’s call to give McClenaghan the 20th wasn’t. Their batting side didn’t quite get going, there were not a lot of runs to get but Umesh Yadav’s first spell was decisive. He has been at his best with the new ball, Tim Southee, Yuzvendra Chahal, Mohammad Siraj and de Grandhomme were all spot on and despite Hardik Pandya’s half century Mumbai fell short of the target and are virtually out of the race of the playoffs now.

After the win, the winning captain, RCB’s Virat Kohli said:

We needed that win. Very important win. Tonight was an occasion we need that two points. We might have spoken about too many things. Take your fields. To confuse them, doesn’t help too much. Everyone bowled really well. Umesh over. Colin’s over with the bat. Manan took the game away from them. We needed impact performance. We had good intent, results are around the corner. We should take this confidence forward. My wife is here and it’s her birthday. It’s very important to achieve this two points in front of her.

The visiting captain Rohit Sharma after their defeat said:

It is disappointing to be on the losing side. We got ourselves to blame though. Didn’t play smart cricket, losing wickets in the powerplay didn’t help. We wanted to keep ticking with the scoreboard. Credit to RCB, they bowled really well, it was a tough wicket and they kept us guessing. I think our bowling was good, but we could have kept them down to some 10-15 runs short. We came back well after that partnership between Kohli and McCullum, but as I said, we made silly mistakes and that cost us. We still need to have the belief in ourselves, need to win almost all our games now. We need to keep to the basics, I feel we still have a good chance to qualify for the knock-out phase of the tournament.

Man of the Match Tim Southee said:

Nice to finally get a win on the board. There was a little bit of swing. I think we scaped through to a good score. Colin’s innings gave the momentum. We still needed to bowl well to defend. We have come close. Nice to get over the line. It’s nice to get a win under the belt.