Indian Premier League 2021: Chennai Wins The Opener To Back At Top Of Points Table!

Indian Premier League 2021: Chennai Wins The Opener To Back At Top Of Points Table!

A terrific performance from Rituraj Gayakwad has helped Chennai Super Kings to beat Mumbai Indians by 20 runs in the second leg opener played in Dubai. Once Chennai was looking in danger at 7 runs for 3 wickets but then Rituraj showed resistance to put CSK out of danger and set the target of 157 for Mumbai Indians. The Blue army failed to reach the target and fell at 136 in their given 20 overs. 

It was MS Dhoni, CSK’s skipper who won the toss and decided to bat first. MI pacers combo, Trent Boult and Adam Milne thrashed the top order of Chennai. Boult removed experienced Faf Du Plessis in the first over. Adam Milne strike in the second over and got the wicket of all-rounder Moeen Ali. Then Boult got his second wicket in the second over after he sent Mr. IPL aka Suresh Raina back to the pavilion. CSK was reduced to 7 for 3. 

Rituraj was still on the crease. Skipper Dhoni added 17 runs with him but fall to Adam Milne just at the end of the powerplay. The yellow army was in deep trouble at the end of the powerplay, they just made 24 runs and lost 4 wickets. Then, all-rounder, Ravindra Jadeja matched bat with Rituraj and took CSK above 100. They both built a fine partnership of 81 runs. In between Rituraj completed one of the most important fifties. Jasprit Bumrah finally got the breakthrough as he sent Jadeja back to the dugout. 

Then came the Bravo storm. West Indian all-rounder Dwayne Bravo played a fine cameo of 23 runs on just 8 balls with 3 sixes. His innings helped CSK to reach above 150. On the other hand, Rituraj too played some fine shots. Bumrah got rid of Bravo at the last over. Gayakwad remained not out on 88. Boult, Bumrah, and Milne got 2-2-2 wickets each.

Since Mumbai was playing without regular skipper Rohit Sharma and star all-rounder Hardik Pandya so West Indian star Kieron Pollard was captaining the MI side. The blue army didn’t start well. Opening batsman Quinton de Kock fell early on the team score of 18. Deepak Chahar took good use of the new ball and got one more wicket of new man Anmolpreet Singh. At the end of the powerplay, MI lost Suryakumar Yadav too. The team total was 37 for 3. 

From Mumbai, Left-handed batsman Saurabh Tiwari played a fine inning of 50. He stayed unbeaten at the end. He got no support from any other batsman and the whole Mumbai team just scored 136 runs by losing 8 wickets. From CSK, Bravo took 3 wickets, Chahar got 2. Josh Hazelwood and Shardul Thakur 1-1 each. 

Here is the tweet,

.@ChennaiIPL WIN by 20 runs and have added 2 more points to their tally.#VIVOIPL #CSKvMI pic.twitter.com/qVh9ZfwB2E

— IndianPremierLeague (@IPL) September 19, 2021