Credit: X
In the highest-ever scoring match in the IPL history, Sunrisers Hyderabad defended the 277-run total successfully against Mumbai Indians by 31 runs to register their first win of 2024. After the conclusion of the match, Irfan Pathan slammed the MI captain, Hardik Pandya, for his 120 strike-rate, when he needed to go at around 200 runs per hundred balls.
Notably, Sunrisers Hyderabad set up a massive score of 277 runs on the board in front of their adoring Orange Army, on the back of three power-packed fifties from Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, and Heinrich Klaasen. Apart from Jasprit Bumrah, who conceded runs at an economy rate of nine, the rest of the Mumbai Indians bowlers were comfortably above 11, with the 17-year-old debutant Kwena Maphaka giving away 66 runs in his four-over spell. Check the top betting trends on the best betting apps in India and sites.
The run chase for Mumbai Indians was going exceedingly well at the halfway mark of their innings, with the score reading 141/2. But the Sunrisers Hyderabad bowlers managed to halt the scoring rate of MI batters in the second half, restricting them to 246/5 at the end of their innings at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad.
All the MI batters scored at a strike rate of more than 188 during their pursuit of the 278-run target, but the captain Hardik Pandya could only score 24 runs off 20 balls at a strike rate of 120. This drew big criticism from Irfan Pathan, who wrote on his official X account, “If the whole team is playing with the strike of 200, Captain can’t bat with the batting strike rate of 120.”
But, shortly afterward, the former Indian all-rounder also commented that he expects a comeback from Mumbai Indians in IPL 2024. The next post from Irfan Pathan on X read, “I will be surprised if MI doesn’t come back. It’s a solid solid team on paper.”
Meanwhile, his elder brother, Yusuf Pathan, was very critical of the way Hardik Pandya handled the Mumbai Indians bowlers against Sunrisers Hyderabad, calling it “bad captaincy” in regards to giving Jasprit Bumrah only one over in the first half of the opposition innings when they were scoring quite heavily. The former Indian all-rounder also didn’t like how Hardik Pandya gave the 20th and the final over of the Sunrisers Hyderabad innings to Shams Mulani, the left-arm orthodox spinner.
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