MI Vs SRH: Suryakumar Yadav’s Second IPL Hundred Powers Mumbai Indians To Fourth Win

Mumbai: Suryakumar Yadav showed why he is the no.1 T20I batter as the right-hander scored an unbeaten 102 to see Mumbai Indians to a seven-wicket win over Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Wankhede Stadium on Monday. Chasing a below-par 174, Mumbai Indians were 31/3 at one stage with Rohit Sharma, Naman Dhir and Ishan Kishan back in the hut, all dismissed for single digits.

From there on, Suryakumar, along with Tilak Varma, put together 143 runs for the fourth wicket to help Mumbai Indians romp home in 17.3 overs and register their fourth victory in 12 games. This was also Suryakumar’s only second hundred in IPL and was studded with 12 fours and six sixes in 51 balls.

With this hundred, Suryakumar also equalled Rohit Sharma for two hundreds for Mumbai Indians and also became the third batter in the world with four hundreds or more while batting at no.4 in T20s. The right-hander also equalled Ruturaj Gaikwad and KL Rahul with six T20 hundreds by an Indian.

“I have done this after a long time. I fielded for 20 overs and batted for 18 overs, only tired (nothing else to worry about.) I feel it was the need of the hour for me. I went out to bat, needed someone to bat till the end. I just enjoyed my time,” said Suryakumar, who was named the Player of the Match.

Earlier, Hardik Pandya struck form before the T20 World Cup while veteran Piyush Chawla also bagged three wickets as Mumbai Indians restricted Sunrisers Hyderabad for a below-par 173/8. Pandya found rhythm and momentum to return 4-0-31-3 while Chawla (4-0-33-3) produced an impactful performance to trouble the SRH batters.

However, to his credit, SRH skipper Pat Cummins chipped in with a 17-ball 35 (2x4s, 2x6s) late in the innings to take them past the 150-run mark. In complete contrast to last time these teams met earlier in this IPL when SRH hammered 277/3, their usually free-flowing batters struggled for momentum and lack of initiative meant they could never really trouble the Mumbai bowlers.

The batters struggled on a two-paced surface and and MI were quick enough to capitalise. The powerplay had yielded 56 runs for the visitors without any damage but lack of initiative and regular fall of wickets stemmed the flow of runs.

Coming on to bowl only in the second half of the innings, Chawla made the biggest impact with key wickets of Travis Head (48) and Heinrich Klaasen (2) to put Mumbai Indians in complete control. Head, who rode his luck throughout his stay in the middle, could not make the most of it.

With two inside edges for boundaries at the start, SRH’s premier batter appeared to be struggling for timing and rhythm. In the fourth over, on 24, Head made room to smack MI debutant Ankush Kamboj and lost his off-stump in the process but that was when he got his first lifeline as the bowler was found to have overstepped.

Head got another life when Nuwan Thushara spilled a regulation chance at deep third man when the opener was on 44 in the eighth over, but by then, SRH’s decline had already begun. Bumrah had got Abhishek Sharma (11 off 16 balls) caught behind and Mayank Agarwal (5) had become the Kamboj’s first victim.

Nitish Kumar Reddy (20) was bounced out by Pandya, who also snaffled the wicket of Shahbaz Ahmed (10) later on to mark a complete flop show with the bat for SRH.