Mumbai Indians put in a dominating display to return to winning ways in the Women’s Premier League 2024 on Saturday, 2 March. MI smashed hosts Royal Challengers Bangalore at their own den by 7 wickets in their fourth group stage match of the season.
The Mumbai bowlers set up the win with their disciplined bowling in the first innings of the match restricting RCB to just 131 runs in the first innings. However, it was really the MI batters, who came out all gun blazing and handed RCB a really demoralising loss on Saturday. MI took 15.1 overs to reach the target of 132 runs. Guided by a sensational start from Yastika Bhatia (31 off 15) and Hayley Matthews (26 off 21), Mumbai cruised to the target without any problems along the way.
WPL 2024: RCB vs MI Highlights
Mumbai Indians captain Harmanpreet Kaur’s absence did not put any pressure on the visiting side, as English international Nat Sciver-Brunt marshalled her troops to perfection throughout the game.
The loss is a big one for RCB, who have now lost back to back games in the WPL 2024. In the previous match, RCB failed to reach a massive target of 195 runs despite a spirited show with the bat in the second innings against Delhi Capitals, while in this game they failed in both departments of the game.
No Sixes in a T20 Match
The RCB innings was a shocking one to say the least. Despite a tall batting order of Smriti Mandhana, Sophie Devine, Sabhineni Meghana, Ellyse Perry, Richa Ghosh and Georgia Wareham, RCB failed to hit a single six throughout their first innings.
This performance came on the back of their previous match, where RCB and DC players combined to hit the most sixes in a WPL game – 19.
On the day, RCB lost four wickets inside the first 10 overs which put them in huge trouble. Mandhana, Devine and Richa Gosh registered single-figure scores and failed to make any impact in the innings. If it were not for a gritty partnership between Ellyse Perry (44* off 38) and Georgia Wareham (27 off 20) the team would not have been able to put up even 100 runs on the day.
Disciplined Mumbai
Credit must be given to the Mumbai Indians bowlers who adjusted their lengths against each RCB batter in the innings. Barring 23-year-old Sathyamoorthy Keerthana, not a single MI bowler went at a 10+ RPO. Keerthana bowled just one over in the game and conceded 11 runs.
Pooja Vastrakar and Nat Sciver-Brunt were the pick among the bowlers, with 2 wickets each. While Sciver-Brunt gave away 27 runs from her 4 overs, Vastrakar was only hit for 14 runs from her 3.
WPL Points Table
With the win, MI moved to the top of the table with 6 points to their name from 4 matches.
