During the 27th match of the 11th season of the Indian Premier League (IPL) between Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and Mumbai Indians (MI) at Pune, Rohit Sharma, captain of Mumbai Indians, played an archetype captain’s innings as he guided his team to an 8-wicket victory.
After Rohit Sharma won the toss and put the home team in to bat, Chennai Super Kings scored 169-5 in their allotted quota of 20 overs. Their innings was powered by Suresh Raina’s 33rd IPL half-century, 75* (47), with the help of six fours and four sixes.
Rohit Sharma, who came in to bat at No. 3 in the 10th over, cautiously played his first over. Once settled, he took on the opposition bowlers to the extent that he looked unstoppable after that. After Evin Lewis (47) was dismissed, Sharma took the onus onto him, sealing the chase for his team.
Before the start of the penultimate over, Mumbai Indians required 22 runs to win the match. It was at this point in time that Sharma stood the tallest, scoring 17 runs in a Shardul Thakur over. On the second delivery of the over, Sharma sliced a full and wide delivery over Harbhajan Singh for a four. On the following delivery, he walked across to hit another four through the fine leg area.
It wasn’t only about the brutal hits as Sharma found the gap between the point fielder and the short third-man on the next ball to score another four. On the last ball of the over, Sharma swept the right-arm medium-fast bowler for another four through the deep square leg region. The shot also brought up his 34th IPL half-century.
Mumbai Indians sealed the chase in the next over. Sharma ended up scoring 56* (33) with the help of six fours and two sixes. Watch the full video of the penultimate over of Mumbai’s innings:
Hitman went berserk! pic.twitter.com/UidTk3ZRa7
— Videos Shots (@videos_shots) April 28, 2018
Watch how the Twitterati reacted on Sharma’s innings:
Mumbai Indians won two games in this season and Rohit Sharma scored a half-century on that two matches…
— Broken Cricket (@BrokenCricket) April 28, 2018
Mumbai win their second match and stay in the hunt. It's good for the tournament that all teams are in it as far as possible. In both of Mumbai's victory, Rohit Sharma has scored a half century. He must bat in the top 3. #CSKvsMI
— Mohammad Kaif (@MohammadKaif) April 28, 2018
Rohit Sharma has all the power to clear boundary but he played smartly to get those three boundaries…
— Broken Cricket (@BrokenCricket) April 28, 2018
Mumbai Indians Beat Chennai Super Kings By 8 Wickets. Good Comeback By The Team And Captain Rohit Sharma. 💛😇💪 #CSKvMI #CSKvsMI #MumbaiIndians
— Sir Ravindra Jadeja (@SirJadeja) April 28, 2018
Once again Rohit Sharma’s Half Century Guided MI to Win.
Shows You Need Your Best Batsman To play Till the end.
I Always want Him to Open If Not then No3 is Much Better.@mipaltan Congratulations— Its Raj..! (@iLoyalSalmanFan) April 28, 2018
Rohit Sharma U Beauty😘😘#CSKvMI
— Roshni Walia (@RoshniWalia45) April 28, 2018
Rohit Sharma should try coming in at number 11 in the next match!!
— Mahesh Manjrekar (@manjrekarmahesh) April 24, 2018
It was clever call by Rohit Sharma. He elected to bowl first because he knows CSK very good at chasing targets.
— B L A C K 🇮🇳 (@VijayFreak_) April 28, 2018
#Rohit_sharma to himself😂😂#CSKvMI pic.twitter.com/2kxzyYx75z
— Mast Malang ^_^ (@sanket_daksha) April 28, 2018
Days when, jokes apart, you realise why Rohit Sharma is appreciated the way he is. Truly class apart 👏🏻👏🏻 #CSKvMI
— richa singh (@richa_singh) April 28, 2018
@ImRo45 thank you rohit sharma! My mum loves cricket and she’s super happy tonight. Which means I won’t get a pre sleep casual rant. You don’t know what you’ve done for me. Oh, and well played!
— Benafsha (@BenafshaSoona) April 28, 2018