Royal Challengers Bangalore vs Mumbai IndiansHighlights today Friday, 9-04-2021 – 1st Match (N), Indian Premier League season 14th from MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chepauk, Chennai.
RCB team’s captain won the toss and chose to bowl first.
Rohit says this looks a good track. Looking to get some wins early on, he says. Lynn and Jansen are the only two changes from their title-winning squad in the UAE last year.
“Unbelievable,” says Kohli after winning the toss. They didn’t want to give Mumbai the chance to chase, considering how much they love doing that. Says RCB has batting depth for good chasing this year and that the decision was a no-brainer. Maxwell, Jamieson, and Christian are making their debuts. Padikkal misses out due to health concerns, they don’t want to rush him so early after Covid recovery – Rajat Patidar makes a debut.
Royal Challengers Bangalore team: 1 Virat Kohli (capt), 2 Rajat Patidar, 3 AB de Villiers (wk), 4 Glenn Maxwell, 5 Daniel Christian, 6 Washington Sundar, 7 Kyle Jamieson, 8 Shahbaz Ahmed 9 Harshal Patel, 10 Mohammed Siraj, 11 Yuzvendra Chahal.
Mumbai Indians team: 1 Rohit Sharma (capt), 2 Chris Lynn, 3 Suryakumar Yadav, 4 Ishan Kishan (wk), 5 Hardik Pandya, 6 Kieron Pollard, 7 Krunal Pandya, 8 Marco Jansen, 9 Rahul Chahar, 10 Trent Boult, 11 Jasprit Bumrah.
Post match Presentation:
AB de Villiers: Was an incredible game of cricket, always seems to be against Mumbai. We obviously came in knowing it wasn’t going to be easy. I knew halfway it was going to get tough, it’s one of those pitches that get harder as the game goes on. They have a wonderful bowling lineup that puts us under pressure.
[His wicket] There was an easy two in my opinion, but as I started it felt like I was running backward. Krunal got it to spot on with the throw. It absolute pleasure playing alongside Maxwell. I love playing with players like him, fantastic to have someone like that bat ahead of me and Christian behind me. We have a nice little setup. There’s a reason why Mumbai have won this trophy five times, there’s a lot of aura around them. But that was the challenge, to beat the champions and get a lot of confidence. We did well tonight.
Rohit Sharma: Winning the championship is important, I guess, not the first game. Great fight, we didn’t let it go easily. Although the score wasn’t something we were happy with. We were 20 short. We made some mistakes, those are bound to happen. We need to move on. [Jansen] is definitely a talent we’ve identified. When you look at the situation with four overs left they had AB and Christian, that’s why we went with Bumrah and Boult to try and get them out.
Definitely not an easy pitch to bat on, oddball was gripping. That’s something we could think of in our next few games here. De Villiers batted really well and got them home. In hindsight, we can say that [the intensity will take time to arrive]. We haven’t had much time together as a group and it was totally opposite in Dubai, where we began preparations a month before. But that’s how the IPL has been played over the years, you just got to get in the game as quickly as possible. It can be difficult for teams that have great home records, but that is what sport is, you’ve got to go away and win. We are fortunate that we’re even in the park.
Match Timings: 14:00 GMT | 19:30 Local
Umpires – KN Ananthapadmanabhan, Nitin Menon
TV Umpires – Chettithody Shamshuddin
Match Referee – Vengalil Narayan Kutty
Reserve Umpire – Ulhas Gandhe
Match number – IPL Season 14th 1st Match
