Mumbai Indians legend Kieron Pollard blows his fuse, gets punished by the BCCI after Punjab Kings game

The West Indian, now Mumbai Indians batting coach, used an ‘audible expletive’ during his team's chase of 201 at Dharamsala.

Updated on: May 15, 2026, 10:47:53 IST

Written by Prateek Srivastava

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Mumbai Indians had a great night on Thursday as they beat Punjab Kings in the last over at Dharamsala. But now some of the sheen of that win has been taken off by a controversy involving batting coach Kieron Pollard.

Kieron Pollard got carried away a bit. (AP)

Pollard has been charged with using an ‘audible obscenity’ during the 19th over of Mumbai Indians' chase. At the end of the 18th over, Mumbai Indians still needed 28 runs off 12 balls and their dugout looked really tense. Will Jacks of England hit a six off the first ball off Aussie pacer Xavier Bartlett to ease their nerves a bit. During this over something happened that led Pollard to lose his cool and use an expletive.

Also Read: Sarpanch Shreyas Iyer's 'aura farming' takes a hit; MI put PBKS in their place after Karan Aujla song dig

The Indian Premier League (IPL) or the BCCI has not given details as to when exactly the West Indian lost his cool and what triggered it. Anyway, the former Mumbai Indians player, with them during their all five title wins in 2013, 2015, 2017, 2019 and 2020, has admitted that he was in the wrong. He has been fined 15% off his applicable match fee and has been given one demerit point.

"Kieron Pollard, Batting Coach, Mumbai Indians has been fined 15% of his applicable match fee and accumulated one demerit point for breaching Level 1 of the IPL’s Code of Conduct for Players and Team officials.

"Pollard was found to have breached article 2.3 of the IPL’s Code of Conduct, which relates to “use of an audible obscenity during a match.

"The incident occurred in the 19th over of the second innings when Pollard used abusive language towards the fourth umpire.

Pollard admitted to the offence and accepted the sanction imposed by Match Referee, Pankaj Dharmani," an IPL release said on Friday.

What a night for Mumbai Indians!

Anyway, on Thursday night, Mumbai Indians returned to winning ways as they chased down 201 with one ball to go and six wickets in hand. Tilak Varma hit successive sixes off the fourth and fifth balls of the 20th over to take his team over the line in a fantastic display of power-hitting.

He remained unbeaten on 75 off 33 balls. His 56-run stand for the fifth wicket off 20 balls with Jacks proved decisive as MI registered their second win in their last three matches. Although, they are out of play-off contention and now are only playing for pride.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Prateek Srivastava
Prateek Srivastava is a senior sports journalist having been in the profession for two decades now. He started his print career with the India Today Group and later also worked for the Asian Age. In 2009, sensing the wind of change, he switched to the digital media and joined Mobile ESPN. There, he covered the 2011 Cricket World Cup and 2010 Hockey World Cup as a venue reporter. He did plenty of voice-over work too, over there. After leaving Mobile ESPN, Prateek went on to work for Cricketnext, Gocricket and Cricbuzz. At Gocricket (Times Internet Limited), he covered the 2014 T20 World from Bangladesh. There he also received a team leadership award, given at the end of the month. Prateek has also covered the 2016 T20 World Cup in India, this time working for Sportz Interactive. He also worked for Chinese giants Alibaba over two years and led their ""Short News"" content team at UC Browser. While cricket is Prateek’s expertise, he has also done a lot of golf. In fact, he has covered India’s first two European Tour events back in the late noughties. He has also done extensive writing on football having been associated with the Indian Super League for three seasons. Finally, Prateek is a literature aficionado and swears by Philip Roth and Gabriel Garcia Marquez, and when he doesn’t joke, he is usually quiet and at work.Read More

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