Many strings in his bow

Wagging his left index finger furiously in the air, Akash Madhwal sprinted towards the stumps he had shattered to pick his fifth wicket of the night. Ishan Kishan climbed onto him, other ruffled his hair, as Mumbai Indians celebrated wildly.

After the celebrations were over, he emerged from the huddle with a tired but happy face, his hair disheveled and his name ringing in the stands. The fifth wicket was achieved in a fitting manner, with a yorker, the mastery of which made his famous.

But while picking up the five-wicket haul, he showed he was not just a yorker-merchant. Nicholas Pooran was foxed by a delicious out-swinger from around the wicket, angling into him and shaping away; Ayush Badoni was castled with a sharp nip-backer, Prerak Mankad deceived by one that straightened off the seam after pitching, Chis Jordan was beaten for pace.

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Double spin attack pays dividends, indirectly

Two spinners of contrasting styles and methods shared the new ball for Lucknow Super Giants—left-arm spinner Krunal Pandya and off-spinner Krishna Gowtham. The rationale behind the move was understandable, LSG’s pacers are raw and have been bleeding runs; besides the Chepauk surface has been abetting spin bowling, the ball gipping off the surface occasionally, and some balls keeping low. The ploy almost paid off, as K Gowtham induced a thick outside edge off Ishan Kishan in the second over. Rohit Sharma unusually embraced early risks, when he slugged Pandya over long-on before sweeping him off the stumps. Yet, Pandya beat him beautifully in the air, only for the ball to evade the stumps by a whisker. Though neither picked a wicket in the first three overs, the pressure they piled on, forced a folly from Sharma in the fourth over, when he sliced a length ball to cover.

Remember the name

As soon as Naveen-ul-Haq saw Ayush Badoni pouch Rohit Sharma’s mis-hit at cover, he turned his back at the batsman and pointed his fingers to his name and number on the jersey. He then put his fingers in his ears and stared into the skies, as if stating that he does not listen to all the outside chatter. The Afghan’s name has become infamous after his exchanges with Virat Kohli a fortnight ago. He mocked Kohli again on the night RCB failed to qualify for the playoffs, and now he has taken his pantomime villainy to Sharma. The wicket-ball, though, was nothing special and it was more of Sharma’s indiscretion than Haq’s smarts. Sure, the IPL will remember his name, even though he has not conjured anything extraordinary with the ball.

Face of helplessness

At the end of the ninth over, Mohsin Khan wandered to some distant corner of the field with an empty face. He had pounded two short balls in the over with all his energy, bending his back and letting out a grunt. Both times, he saw the ball disappear deep into the stands. The first was a short ball angled into Surkyakumar Yadav’s body, which the fastest blade in the IPL pulled between the keeper and short fine-leg. He made a difficult shot ridiculously simple, he just got outside the line of the ball and slapped it up and over, leaving the crowd awestruck, The second ball was middle-stumpish and hustling to Cameron Green, who pulled him through square-leg on the front foot. Khan simply stood helpless.

Haq in dreamland

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Cameron Green and Suryakumar on rampage mode, few would have expected Krunal Pandya to bring Naveen-ul-Haq back into bowling. The medium pacer, with his proneness to over-experiment and missing lengths, could end up being meat and drink to the two most in-form batsmen in the league. Yadav punched his first ball through extra-cover gorgeously, without a modicum of violence. A long over beckoned He could have bled another four, but for Ravi Bishnoi’s verve. Haq shook his head in dismay. The next ball, though, was an out-swinging beauty that beat Yadav. With the fourth, he nailed his man. It was a slower-ball leg-cutter that Yadav looked to thump down the ground. He was early into the short, and the ball lobbed in the air off the top half of his bat. The over would only get better—and arguably match-turning—as Haq castled Green with an off-cutter at 105 kph off the last ball. Haq was in dreamland and celebrated maniacally. On his most important night in IPL, he nailed the three best batsmen of Mumbai.

Long road to joy

It seemed a long over. Naveen-ul-Haq bowled three successive wide balls, all angling across and angling away to the left-handed Tilak Varma. It seemed to frustrate everyone—Haq was blowing his cheeks in exasperation, Krunal Pandya was pleading with his bowler to just bowl at the stumps. Even Varma got restless, shaking his head each time the ball sped away far from the reach of his outstretched bat. The fourth ball—the second legal ball though—was perfect. Wide, not wide enough to be judged wide, full but not full enough to swing down the ground. Varma just threw his bat at Haq’s trademark off-cutter, bowled like you open a door-knob (the index and middle finger work down the side of the ball so that the thumb passes over the top of the ball), and the long-on fielder devoured the mishit.

Short-ball nemesis

Kyle Mayers hit his pads in anger and shook his head in disgust. He has been devoured by another short ball. It was a cross-seamer that skidded on, angling a trifle away. There was hardly any room for a free-swing of the bat, and he tried to short-arm pull the ball, but the hustle meant he was a fraction late into the shot and the ball took the upper half of his bat and lobbed lazily into hands of Cameron Green, prowling the mid-on. It is not that he is a horrible puller, the pull is in fact one of his staple strokes and he nails most of it, but this IPL this has been nemesis. As many five times in 13 outings has the short-ball undone him.

Shokeen’s shocker

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This was straight out of a nightmare. Hrithik Shokeen’s idea was to stifle Marcus Stoinis with flat off-breaks from around the stumps in the last over of the power-play. The field was thus set, offside heavy and with two men protecting the leg-side boundaries. And then the Mumbai Indian spinner produced two long hops, so short that he should be happy that he conceded two fours rather than two sixes. The next ball, he overcompensated by going too full and loopy and Stoinis made one long stride and swung him down the ground for a six. The 18-run over reversed the momentum in favour of Super Giants who seemed genuinely struck for runs.

Rohit leaps, wickets follow

Rohit Sharma stayed an eternity on the ground. A couple of teammates patted on his back and offered to lift him back to his feet. Rohit politely refused and sprung to his feet like a sprightly teenager. This was after he made a throwback save at cover, lunging full stretch, fully air-borne to stop a crisply-hit drive by Ayush Badoni, destined to the fence. Graeme Swann stuck a fine analogy, “like a salmon leaping up the river.” Not only did he save those four runs, but he sustained the pressure Piyush Chawla and Akash Madhwal were piling on. Two balls later, a frustrated Badoni swiped in ungainly fashion and ended up losing his stumps. The next ball, Madhwal produced a ripping out-swinger (angled in from around the stumps and moved a shade away) to snare the outside edge of Nicholas Pooran to have Super Giants teetering.

Forgetting the old adage

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Watch the runner and not the ball, goes the cricketing adage as old as the game itself. But Marcus Stoinis and Deepak Hooda both paid it no heed and Stoinis ended up being run out. Stoinis flicked handsomely to deep midwicket and the pair was strolling back for the second run, but their eyes hooked on the ball, as though by a hypnotic path. Often, one of the batsmen, the one running towards the danger end, would be spotted ball=-watching. But here both were and ended up colliding into each other. The collision took the steam to Stoinis and by the time he regathered, he was run out. Both stared at each other puzzled, even as Mumbai’s fielders celebrated the lucky slip that could possibly be game-changing. Stoinis, batting so serenely, might have felt devastated, but only he had looked towards the partner rather than the ball.

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