 Mumbai: Riding on Sachin Tendulkar's masterful 72 and Shikhar Dhawan's blazing 56, Mumbai Indians defeated Chennai Super Kings by five wickets in an Indian Premier League match here on March 25.
Super Kings scored 180 for two with Suresh Raina (83) and Subramaniam Badrinath (55) sharing an unbeaten stand of 142 runs. Mumbai Indians chased down the target with an over to spare. Tendulkar continued with his amazing run in the tournament, scoring 72 off 52 balls, striking eight fours and one six. Left handed Dhawan hit 56 off 34 balls with five fours and three sixes.
With the victory, Mumbai Indians reached at the top of the table with four wins in five matches. Super Kings are at fifth place with two victories in six matches. Dhawan demolished the Super Kings bowling and with the left-hander in rampaging form, Tendulkar focussed on rotating the strike.
After Tendulkar pierced the covers with his brilliant timing off Albie Morkel for the innings' first four, Dhawan opened the floodgates with a flurry of strokes. Joginder Sharma was struck for three fours in the fifth over while Laxmipathy Balaji went for two sixes in the next. Spinner Shadab Jakati, who had brilliant run in IPL last year, was treated with same disdain by Dhawan.
But it was a case of one shot too many as Dhawan fell off Jakati while attempting to clear him off the ground. Super Kings fought back with the wickets of Saurabh Tiwary and R. Sathish. Tendulkar then guided the innings keeping his team in the hunt. Mumbai Indians needed 60 to win from 38 balls, but Tendulkar and Kieron Pollard looked in command.
Tendukar hit the 200th six of IPL, chaging down the track off the best bowler of the tournament Muttiah Muralitharan. Pollard played a cameo hitting 20 off 9 balls with three fours and an amazing straight six with the flick of his wrist off Muralitharan. But Muraliathan got his wicket in the next ball. After Tendulkar departed Dwayne Bravo (14) took the team home.
Earlier, Super Kings innings got off to a good start as Matthew Hayden (20) began in blazing fashion, this time with a conventional bat but with same effect, hitting Zaheer Khan for four successive fours. The first one was an edge to the third man boundary but the next three were struck with brute power. Hayden, however, did not stay for long as Harbhajan Singh trapped him leg before. Parthiv Patel soon followed bowled by Ryan McLaren.
Raina and Badrinath then strongly held the reins of the innings. Left handed Raina was unperturbed by the loss of wickets and shifted to attacking gears. Raina was severe on Bravo, hitting the medium pacer for a six over backward square leg and a sweetly-timed four at extra cover. Raina hit seven fours and three sixes while Badrianth's 45-ball innings had six fours. They brought up the second highest stand of the IPL, but could not accelerate towards the end.
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