It seems that the journey of Mumbai Indians to win IPL 2024 has come to an end. After consecutive losses in four matches, Mumbai Indians have now reached the bottom of the points table, and it seems they have no plan to get back on the winning track.
They struggled to defend 145 runs against Lucknow. It was very difficult to defend 145 runs in this year’s IPL, as the batting team often includes an extra batter and applies the rule of an impact player.
Mumbai Indians’ bowling, relying on Jasprit Bumrah, struggled, while their main spinners, Piyush Chawla and Mohammad Nabi, were unsuccessful in taking big wickets.
The struggles of the spinners indicate that when your spinners don’t perform well, you can’t take wickets in the middle overs, and Mumbai Indians are paying the price for it. This has been their story throughout the tournament.
Additionally, regarding batting, Hardik Pandya has struggled to make any significant contributions so far for Mumbai Indians in IPL 2024. He needs to perform better. Against Lucknow today, he was sent back to pavallion for a naught.
Speaking of bowling, apart from Jasprit Bumrah, no bowler seems capable of stopping the runs. Although Gerald Coetzee and Nuwan Thushara took wickets, they also leaked runs. This is not good news for the team.
Mumbai’s confidence seems to be almost shattered with this loss. Despite having a batting lineup from number one to number eight, they are still unable to score 150 runs.
This either means there is no intent in batting, or the batsmen are out of form. Today, Ishan Kishan played an innings of 32 runs off 36 balls against Lucknow.
It seemed like he was trying to play the role of a finisher like MS Dhoni, aiming to score 70-80 runs in the last five overs, but it didn’t happen.
If you have played 30-35 balls poorly, it’s your responsibility to maintain the momentum. You can’t expect the lower order players to score 50 runs in the last four overs and post a winning score.
After that, Nehal Wadhera and others played well, but Rohit Sharma failed on his birthday, managing only four runs. Similarly, Suryakumar Yadav is struggling. Although he performs well on flat pitches, he struggles on pitches with some help for bowlers.
Hardik Pandya’s captaincy hasn’t been very impressive either. When you’re defending a small score, the attempt should be to force the batsmen to play big shots and not let them take easy singles and doubles, thereby keeping the game close.
However, Hardik Pandya’s approach was such that the batsmen didn’t have to play boundary shots and kept taking singles and doubles, and it felt that this approach was a bit defensive.
In such situations, a captaincy that appears defensive and doesn’t show confidence in its fielders or bowlers is doesn’t lead to good results often times.
Shouting and getting frustrated with one’s bowlers and fielders, which is not a good sign for the team, shows that everything is not good in the team. A captain should have a calm personality, but Pandya seems to be the opposite.
