Mumbai Indians’ (MI) bowling coach Shane Bond has said that Mohammed Siraj’s opening spell turned out to be too good in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 match against Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB). On Sunday, April 2, Siraj registered the figures of 3-0-5-1 after his first spell at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium in Bangalore.

Siraj picked up the crucial wicket of Ishan Kishan, who was going strong, having hit two fours. He also had a chance to dismiss Rohit Sharma, but a dropped catch didn’t allow that to take place as well. Bond also said that Siraj forced the batters to play shots out of the ordinary as well.

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“You look at those first three overs from Siraj. He didn’t give any width, he gave nothing up. He used his bouncer beautifully. He gave us nothing to hit, forced us in to take some shots, and got wickets from it,” Shane Bond told the reporters after the match. “We were always well behind. We had a long batting order, we tried to up the ante, and we got to 170. So I think for us, we know that if we can get a decent start, we can score all sorts of runs with the power that we have. But that opening spell was brilliant and too good for us today.”

However, Shane Bond also said that Mumbai Indians were 15-20 runs short in their innings and they were completely outplayed in all three departments.

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“I think 170 runs on such a small ground is not great. I think if we went 190-plus we had a chance. Then we just weren’t as accurate with the ball as we needed to be. We knew how important the opening partnership was to break, but we couldn’t break it, and we couldn’t even apply pressure for sustained periods. We lacked a little bit of control of the ball and Faf (Faf du Plessis) and Virat (Virat Kohli) played beautifully as well. So I suppose today, in all three phases, we were outplayed,” Shane Bond concluded.