Sat, 07 May 2011 - IP Mumbai vs IP Delhi,IPL 2011,49th Match - Bulletin

Mumbai march stamps Delhi

Bulldozing Mumbai continued the demolition job at a packed Wankhede Stadium when they destroyed Delhi in a one-sided affair by 32 runs. Leaders Mumbai are now assured of a spot in the top four while, Delhi’s campaign is almost over as they have very little chance of progressing to the next stage.

The only thing that went right for Delhi was the toss and once they put Mumbai in, it was one-way traffic all the way. They let Mumbai muscle their way to a big total and their reply never got going.

Chasing 179 against a quality Mumbai bowling attack that has variety and depth was never going to be easy unless Viru played another blinder. As has happened all season Delhi had a shocking start, Harbhajan Singh bowled the first over and got one to straighten trapping David Warner in front of the stumps. ‘Slinger’ Malinga bowled the next over, his first delivery, a searing yorker crashed into the base of stumps and a flummoxed Colin Ingram was sent packing. Then came in to bowl Munaf Patel and he knocked the stuffing out of the Delhi chase, Sehwag tried to pull one got a top edge and four balls later Naman Ojha nicked one to the keeper.

After just three overs, the Delhi chase had got over, just the formalities remained. However, Venugopal Rao and James Hopes decided to help their averages and respectively scored 37 and 55 runs. Delhi surely needed more than one Sehwag to pull this one off.

The Mumbai bowling machine for the whole duration was all over the batsmen. There is no let up in quality or intensity when the IPL’s men in blue are in the field. Toe-crushers, in and out swingers, doosra, in short the Mumbai arsenal has all the weapons of destruction. The pitch was more than helpful for the Mumbai bowlers, Harbhajan got spin, Munaf got the out-swing going and Malinga hardly pitches it, so he is equally effective everywhere.

However, when Mumbai were batting, the same pitch looked like an absolute belter. Sachin Tendulkar and Aiden Blizzard got the home team to a flier, with the Australian taking charge very early and hit Morne Morkel for a couple fours in the very first over. Blizzard played with brute power particularly square of the wicket and Sachin’s easy-on-the-eye punch drives made it look like a boundary hitting competition. Seven boundaries were hit in a space of eight balls; Blizzard hit five in an over from Morkel much to the agony of tall South-African.

In between all this carnage, Irfan Pathan’s swing went unnoticed; he got one to slightly bend into Tendulkar and rattled his timber while the little master tried to play an ugly slog. Blizzard’s dismissal in the very next over revived Delhi hopes momentarily before two of Mumbai’s most consistent batsmen, Ambati Rayudu and Rohit Sharma put a superb 87 run partnership in little less than 10 overs. The two targeted Delhi all-rounder James hopes who leaked 45 runs in 4 overs. They finished with respective scores of 59 and 49 runs.

Though, Delhi managed to pull back things a little bit after Rohit’s dismissal but the damage had been done as Mumbai got to a mammoth score of 178 runs. For the visitors, the only silver lining in the otherwise forgettable bowling performance was the swing of Pathan and the conservative left arm spinners of youngster Shahbaz Nadeem, both of them getting a wicket apiece.