IPL 2021: Pollard blitz delivers Mumbai Indians last-ball win over CSK

IPL 2021: Kieron Pollard’s unbeaten, 34-ball 87 on a flat Delhi wicket took champions MI home by four wickets from an improbable 81/3 at the halfway mark chasing 219.

Before Saturday, Kieron Pollard had precious little to contribute in this IPL season, scoring 81 runs and picking up one wicket in Mumbai Indians' (MI) six outings. Against Chennai Super Kings (CSK), Pollard surpassed both numbers in a go.

Kieron Pollard hit the fastest half-century of the season. (IPL/Twitter)

Pollard’s unbeaten, 34-ball 87 on a flat Delhi wicket took champions MI home by four wickets from an improbable 81/3 at the halfway mark chasing 219. The onslaught started in the 13th over when he smacked three successive sixes off Ravindra Jadeja. The 14th over by Shardul Thakur yielded a six and three fours as CSK’s strategy of bowling at length and wide to the big man wasn’t bearing fruit. Sam Curran removed Krunal Pandya in a brilliant two-run 17th over that brought the equation to 48 off 18 balls.

When Faf du Plessis, with one of the safest hands manning the boundary, dropped Pollard at long-on off the penultimate ball of the 18th over, you just sensed it was Pollard’s night. And it was. With 16 to win off the final over, Pollard hit two fours, a six and ran like a hare with two needed off the final ball.

The Trinidadian’s 17-ball half-century was the fastest of this season, an effort that bettered Ambati Rayudu’s fifty by three balls earlier on Saturday that lifted CSK from 136/4 after the 15th over to 218/4.

Rayudu’s unbeaten 72 (27b) after Bumrah and Pollard took three wickets in two overs was the kind of sucker punch CSK’s batting line-up in its prime was known to throw. Rayudu’s knock had seven of the 16 sixes in the innings, ranging from rocking back and depositing leg-spinner Rahul Chahar over square leg to stepping down for two sixes sailing over Dhawal Kulkarni to pulling Trent Boult. Even Bumrah wasn’t spared; his spell leaked 56 runs for the solitary wicket, his most expensive four overs in an IPL game.

Rayudu and Jadeja’s unbroken 102-run partnership in the last eight overs provided a fitting flourish to another century stand for the second wicket between du Plessis (50, 28b) and Moeen Ali (58, 36b) that reiterated the quality and form of the CSK top-order this season.

MI openers Rohit Sharma and Quinton de Kock too showed their class in the chase, keeping the tempo by adding 58 in the powerplay phase. But three strikes in three overs thereafter loosened MI’s grip, until Pollard unleashed himself.