IPL 2021: Kolkata Knight Riders Chokes As Mumbai Indians Win By 10 Runs (Match Report)

Rahul Chahar led the bowling attack against Kolkata Knight Riders(KKR) and helped Mumbai Indians defend a 153 run target in the 5th match of the IPL 2021 on Tuesday. 

Brief Score: Mumbai Indians - 152/10 in 20 Overs (Suryakumar Yadav - 56; Andre Russell - 5/15) & Kolkata Knight Riders - 142/7 (Nitish Rana - 57; Rahul Chahar - 4/27) 

Kolkata Knight Riders vs Mumbai Indians - IPL 2021 5th Match 

Chasing 153, KKR was cruising at the halfway stage with nine wickets in hand. Openers Nitish Rana and Shubman Gill had a 72 run partnership for the first wicket in 54 balls. Rana continued his fine form with the bat to score his second consecutive fifty. Gill supported him well as he scored 33 runs from 24 balls. 

Rahul Chahar got the first breakthrough and suddenly KKR lost four wickets in no time with the score reading 122/4 with all the top four batsmen back to the Pavillion. Chahar finished with his best IPL figures of 4/27. 

KKR still looked very well in the game with just 31 needed off 28 balls and the pair of Dinesh Karthik and Andre Russell on the crease. To make things worse for MI, they dropped Russell twice. 

But something unusual followed as Karthik and Russell, some of the most devasting batsmen in the death overs, approached the target by taking singles. 

In the final over, 15 runs were needed and Trent Boult removed Dre Rus and Pat Cummins as Kolkata fell short by 10 runs, gifting Mumbai their first win of the IPL 2021. 

Earlier, Kolkata captain Eoin Morgan won the toss and opted to bowl first on a pitch that has been tricky for batting especially in the second half. Mumbai scored 42 runs in the powerplay and lost the wicket of Quinton de Kock, who was playing his first match of the season replacing Chris Lynn. 

Rohit Sharma and Suryakumar Yadav built the innings steadily, adding 76 runs in 53 balls for the second wicket. Sharma scored 43 from 32 balls while Suryakumar made full benefit of his sublime form to get to another half-century. 

After the dismissal of Suryakumar, Mumbai suffered a collapse. From 86/2 in 10.3 overs, MI could only add 66 runs in the second half of the innings before being bowled out for 152. 

Andre Russell come into the bowling attack in the 18th over and ended up taking a five-wicket haul in just two overs while giving away 15 runs. 

It was a bizarre game with some extraordinary things happening in the death overs in both the innings of the match.