IPL 2020: 3 Mistakes committed by the losing side in RR vs MI

Mumbai Indians lost their fourth game of the tournament as Rajasthan Royals defeated them is a scintillating manner. Thanks to Ben Stokes‘ miraculous knock, RR chased down a humongous total of 195. However, Mumbai had a lot of positives from this victory but for a team who hadn’t lost a single game without Super Over since their first defeat against CSK, this loss is a wake-up call.

Mumbai made several tactical mistakes in this game as despite Hardik Pandya’s tremendous knock they ended up making less than 200 runs. Also, RR’s chase shouldn’t have been that easy as it looked. Mumbai needs to win one more game to qualify for the playoffs and as they have only three games remaining, the defending champions would want to reach there as soon as possible.

Here are the three mistakes committed by MI against RR:-

1. Sending Saurabh Tiwary ahead of Kieron Pollard and Hardik Pandya

Mumbai Indians are privileged to have extremely strong hitters in Hardik Pandya and Kieron Pollard in the middle order. As they lost their second wicket in 11th over of the innings, one of them should have walked in to score freely and take their team to a big total. However, instead, they sent Saurabh Tiwary at number four. Though Tiwary played a decent knock of 34 off 25 balls Pandya or Pollard could have played a more impactful inning.

2. MI’s low scoring rate in middle overs

Mumbai got off to a flyer and they dominated the RR bowlers in the powerplay. After standing at 59/1 at the end of six overs, they were targeting a score above 200. However, their scoring rate slowed down during the middle overs and they scored on 62 runs in the next 10 overs. If they could have utilized them better, they could have finished at a better score.

3. Only one over for Jasprit Bumrah in first 10 overs

Jasprit Bumrah is one of the best T20 bowlers in the world and he is the leading wicket-taker for Mumbai this season as well. As Ben Stokes and Sanju Samson were taking the game away from MI, Bumrah should have been their go-to bowler. However, Kieron Pollard didn’t use his strike bowler much in the start and he bowled only one over in the first 10. When he came into the attack later, Rajasthan Royals were already in the control of the match.