IPL 2021: Amit Mishra stars as Delhi Capitals trump Mumbai Indians in low-scoring thriller

Delhi Capitals beat Mumbai Indians by 6 wickets in a low-scoring thriller of an IPL 2021 game on Tuesday (April 21). Another win for DC sees them move to second in the IPL 2021 points table. Some quality spin bowling in the first innings by Amit Mishra and Lalit Yadav proved to be the key turning points in this match. Both spinners together managed to pick up 5 wickets, conceding 41 runs in 8 overs. Mishra was the standout performer picking up 4 crucial wickets. Shikhar Dhawan (45) and Steve Smith (33) made sure DC get to the target, although it wasn’t an easy win.

? win against a ? team ?? Nothing sweeter than that ?#YehHaiNayiDilli #DCvMI #IPL2021 https://t.co/Sxx0ZiWE8w

— Delhi Capitals (@DelhiCapitals) April 20, 2021

MI and DC locked horns for the first time in this edition. In the 13th match played at Chepauk, Rohit Sharma won the toss and elected to bat first. The pitch in Chennai usually does not favour the side chasing. MI got off to a flying start with Rohit. His partner Quinton De Kock failed to trouble the scorecard whatsoever though, as he was dismissed by Marcus Stoinis in the 2nd over of the match.

Rohit Sharma alongside Suryakumar Yadav then looked to steady the ship after an early setback. They managed to get through the powerplay overs without losing any more wickets. Avesh Khan who has been a standout bowler for DC this season was brought into the attack. He got them the important breakthrough by dismissing Surya Kumar Yadav (24) who looked in great touch.

Mishra magic

A couple of overs later, the 38 years old and a veteran of the game, Amit Mishra was introduced. He managed to get rid of the MI skipper with a nicely tossed-up delivery in the 9th over of the game, Mishra became the bowler with the most dismissals of the MI skipper in IPL history – seven, one more than Sunil Narine and Vinay Kumar.

Mishra’s number of dismissals against Rohit is tied with Sandeep Sharma’s seven dismissals of Virat Kohli and Zaheer Khan’s seven dismissals of MS Dhoni in the IPL.

Mishra also removed Hardik and Pollard to end up with figures of 4-26 in his quota. Lalit Yadav managed to complete his 4 overs conceding just 17 runs and picking up the wicket of Krunal Pandya. The spinners did the job for DC in this turning Chennai pitch.

Ishan Kishan (26) and Jayant Yadav (23) helped MI to reach 137 in their 20 overs.

THE CHASE

In reply, DC started off the chase pretty similar to MI, Prithvi Shaw was sent back to the pavilion in the 2nd over by Jayant Yadav. Shikhar Dhawan along with Steve Smith paced the innings very well, Dhawan continued his excellent form in this IPL scoring an important 45 and leading in the run getters list.

When Smith and Dhawan were at the crease, DC were well set on reaching the target comfortably. But, as we witnessed in the MI innings, DC lost wickets of Dhawan, Smith and Pant in quick succession.

The match was dragged on until the last, DC needed 15 runs from the final two overs, with the ball in Jasprit Bumrah’s hand. Usually, Bumrah gets the job done at the death very effectively, but he over stepped twice in the over giving away two free hits. This helped DC to settle the nerves. DC got home easily with 5 more balls to spare.

Mumbai Indians will be taking on Punjab Kings on 23^rd April in their next iPL 2021 encounter. Delhi Capitals face off againsts SunRisers Hyderabad on the 25^th.