IPL 2022: Mahela Jayawardene Credits Mumbai Indians' First Win To 'Good Bowling Execution'

A pleased Mumbai Indians' head coach Mahela Jayawardene lauded his bowling attack for executing their plans well and expressed special admiration for debutant left-arm spinner Kumar Kartikeya Singh's figures of 1/19 in his IPL debut.

On Saturday, Mumbai broke their eight-match losing streak when they defeated Rajasthan Royals by five wickets at the D.Y Patil Stadium. On a sticky, two-paced pitch, Mumbai's bowlers restricted Rajasthan to 158/6 and then chased down the total with four balls to spare to register their first win of IPL 2022.

"I think our bowling execution was very good -- we kept Buttler away for long periods of time. Young Kartikeya was brilliant -- he bowled very well in his first game, he showed a lot of character and passion. We have seen him in the nets for a month and felt it was good to give him the opportunity" said Jayawardene in a video posted by the franchise on Sunday.

Jayawardene was full of praise for the team, who he felt rode through a tough phase with a good attitude before getting their first win of the tournament.

"It was a good win after eight games, we got the wrong end of the stick in a few games so it's good to have that first win. I am very proud of the boys -- they worked really hard. Even though we were losing matches, we never went away from our processes, practice and preparation. The attitude and passion they showed on the first day of training was there yesterday as well."

Despite Mumbai losing Rohit Sharma and Ishan Kishan in the first six overs, Suryakumar Yadav led the chase with a 39-ball 51 and was supported well by 35 from Tilak Varma and Tim David blasting an unbeaten nine-ball 20 on a tricky pitch.

"We had a good start with Ishan, he went hard at them and gave us momentum. Then Surya and Tilak were cool and calm in that big partnership that we needed. We had a few hiccups at the end but Timmy (David) and Polly and then Dan finished it off. There is still room to improve for us and we are getting there," concluded Jayawardene.

Mumbai's next match in the tournament will be against table-toppers Gujarat Titans on Friday at Brabourne Stadium.