Shreyas Iyer and Ravichandran Ashwin held their nerve in a tense finish to steer Delhi Capitals to a four wicket victory over Mumbai Indians in the IPL match in Sharjah on Saturday, October 2, 2021.
The Delhi bowlers did well to limit defending champions Mumbai to 129/8 but chasing down the runs wasn't an easy task.
Mumbai staged a good comeback with the ball as they took a few early wickets, reducing Delhi to 30/3 inside the fifth over.
Captain Rishabh Pant (26 from 22 balls) tried to hit his team out of trouble. but his entertaining innings was cut short by off-spinner Jayant Yadav, while Axar Patel (9) and Shimron Hetmyer (15) also perished cheaply.
Having reduced Delhi to 93 for 6 in the 14th over, Mumbai certainly fancied their chances, especially with match-winning bowlers Jasprit Bumrah and Trent Boult at their disposal.
But the experienced duo of Iyer and Ashwin did well to steady Delhi with some sensible batting in the middle overs.
Although they went 18 balls without a boundary, scoring just 13 runs off them, at no stage did Iyer and Ashwin panic.
Iyer broke the shackles, pulling Nathan Coulter-Nile for a boundary over midwicket in the 17th over. He did the same to Bumrah in the next over, hitting the fast bowler again over his favoured midwicket region for another four.
Boult went for just seven runs in the 19th over, setting up a close finish as Delhi Capitals needed four from the final one for victory.
Ashwin ensured there was no late drama as he slogged Krunal Pandya's first ball over midwicket for a six to take his team home with five balls to spare.
The duo put on an unbroken stand of 39 runs for the seventh wicket which helped Delhi inch a step closer to a top-two finish in the standings.
