Mumbai Indians’ Tilak Varma plays a shot during an IPL match against Gujarat Titans. (ANI Photo)
AHMEDABAD: Headlined by Tilak Varma’s maiden IPL century and left-arm pacer Ashwani Kumar’s impactful spell of 4/24, Mumbai Indians (MI) ended their jinx of not having won a match against Gujarat Titans (GT) here.
The clinical 99-run win lifted them to seventh place in the league table, with four points, while GT are sixth with six.Varma (101* off 45b; 8×4, 7×6) injected life into MI’s sputtering innings by plundering 82 off the last 23 balls he faced as MI posted 199/5 after being invited to bat first. Along with Hardik Pandya (15), he added 81 off 38 balls as the visitors hit 96 runs in the last six overs.Go Beyond The Boundary with our YouTube channel. SUBSCRIBE NOW!The chase saw Jasprit Bumrah, till now wicketless this season, draw first blood by having B Sai Sudharsan (0) caught at cover by Krish Bhagat.
Jos Buttler (5) was trapped by Pandya in the next over, while captain Shubman Gill (14) was caught at deep square leg by Naman Dhir in Ashwani’s first over. GT, thereafter, collapsed like a pack of cards to be bowled out for 100 in 15.5 overs and lose by 99 runs.ALSO READ: Tilak Varma outguns Gujarat Titans as record-breaking blitz rewrites IPL historyEarlier, the MI innings seemed to be heading nowhere at the end of the second strategic timeout. Then, Dhir (45 off 32b; 6×4, 1×6) and the Hyderabadi batter steered the team to safety after GT’s new-ball pacers — Kagiso Rabada (3/33) and Mohammed Siraj (1/25) — delivered another power-play bowling masterclass and reduced the visitors to 46/3.
Varma later took matters into his hands, slamming Prasidh Krishna for 19 in the 15th over before hitting leg-spinner Rashid Khan for 15 in the 17th. Siraj stemmed the scoring by delivering a 10-run 19th over, in which he had an out-of-sorts Hardik Pandya (15 off 16b; 1×4) caught at deep midwicket.Varma was not to let go of this opportunity. The southpaw hammered two maximums and two fours off the last over delivered by Prasidh to record his first IPL century. The aggressive approach saw him score 82 off 23 balls.
