Dubai: Mumbai Indians have completed their quintuple in IPL on Tuesday as they defeated the first-time finalist Delhi Capitals by five wickets in the final here at the Dubai International Stadium with eight balls to spare. Captain Rohit Sharma, who has not had a good run this season, came up with a superlative performance (68 off 51) opening the batting to help MI win their first-ever IPL title in the even year. MI won their previous four titles on odd-even year.
In the history of IPL, MI are the only second team to win the trophy for the second consecutive times after CSK, who won back to back titles in 2010 and 2011 respectively. Other than Rohit, Ishan Kishan played an unbeaten 33 runs knock off 19 balls. Krunal Pandya hit the winning run off Anrich Nortje in the fourth ball of the 19th over.
Earlier, MI bowlers, especially Trent Boult put up a brilliant performance with the ball, to deny DC a good start.
What seemed like a repeat of Thursday's Qualifier 1 clash in which Delhi Capitals lost three wickets without putting a run on the board chasing 200, the Delhi side started in a near similar style in Tuesday's 2020 IPL final here at the Dubai International Stadium, but they managed to make a quick recovery against Mumbai Indians to post a moderate 156 for 7 in 20 overs.
In the very first delivery of the final of the 13th edition of IPL, Trent Boult got Marcus Stoinis caught behind by Quinton de Kock for a golden duck. Delhi Capitals lost two more wickets in Ajinkya Rahane and Shikhar Dhawan to end up at 22 for 3 in 3.3 overs. Jayant Yadav bamboozled Dhawan as the southpaw went for an expensive shot, while Ajinkya Rahane fell prey to Boult's down the leg side delivery which took an edge and went down to de Kock's safe hands.
But what next followed is absolute carnage of MI bowlers. Captain Shreyas Iyer was joined by Rishabh Pant in the middle. Both took the responsibility to rebuild the innings from the scratch. Pant played an aggressive knock of 56 off 38 balls while sharing a crucial 96 runs partnership with Iyer for the fourth wicket. The southpaw hit two sixes and four fours to set the tone of Delhi's rest of the innings.
After Pant was caught by Hardik Pandya off Nathan Coulter-Nile's bowling in the final delivery of the 15th over at the fine leg, Iyer has hammered MI bowlers to add some important runs to the board. In the 17th over, he hit Bumrah for a four and then took a double to bring up his third fifty this season.
The right-hander has started slowly, taking singles, but steadied his innings when he felt and played balls as per its merit to make sure DC don't lose any more wickets.
But Shimron Hetmyer, who started with a boundary off Jayant Yadav, fell to a slower in the second ball of the 18th over. He was looking to ramp the delivery and ended up giving a dolly to Coulter-Nile at third man off Boult's bowling. It was Boult's third scalp in the match. Eventually, he finished his superlative spell 4-0-30-3.
This dismissal halted DC's tempo but Iyer, who remained unbeaten on 65 off 50, scored with the help of six fours and two sixes, managed to set 157 runs target for Mumbai Indians in their search for maiden IPL title in the first appearance in the summit clash.
However, in the end, MI had the last laugh as they won their fifth IPL title, the most by any team in the tournament history.
