IPL 2022, CSK vs MI, Top Performances: Tilak's 51* in vain; Dhoni's 6, 4, 2, 4 takes CSK to victory

IPL 2022, CSK vs MI, Top Performances: Mukesh Choudhary's 3-19, Daniel Sams' 4-30 and MS Dhoni's 28 are the top three performances.

MS Dhoni scores 4 runs off the last ball and win game for CSK (Images ©BCCI/IPL)

Brief Scores: MI 155-7 (Tilak 51*, Surya 32, Mukesh 3-19) lost to CSK 156-7 (Rayudu 40, Dhoni 28*, Sams 4-30) by three wickets

Player of the match: Mukesh Choudhary for his rattling spell of 3-19

The El Classico of Tata IPL 2022 where the heavyweights of the league went head-to-head in the 33rd match of the season. The five times IPL champions Mumbai Indians (MI) locked horns with Chennai Super Kings (CSK) Dr DY Patil Sports Academy in Navi Mumbai.

Mumbai have delivered the knockout punch on 19 occasions against Chennai, including three victories in finals. Whereas CSK could only defeat MI 13 times inclusive of only one victory in the finals at the same venue in 2010.

The story is a bit different in 2022, where both the teams find themselves fighting at the bottom of the table than the top of the table. After winning the toss, CSK skipper Ravindra Jadeja opted to field first. Chennai went into this match with two changes, as both the English recruits Moeen Ali and Chris Jordan were replaced by Dwaine Pretorius and Mitchell Santner. On the other hand, from the blue corner we saw a total of three changes, Daniel Sams came back into the squad and two debut caps were handed to Riley Meredith and Hrithik Shokeen, the 19-year-old all-rounder.

Match goes to the last ball with usual suspect MS Dhoni taking matters in his hand

After electing to bowl first, even Ravidnra Jadeja wouldn’t have expected such a terrific start from tall left-arm seamer Mukesh Choudhary, who dismissed both the Mumbai openers within the first over of the match. Mukesh gave the best possible start to Chennai by tormenting Mumbai to reduce them to 23-3 after three overs.

Surya played a few typical SKY-like shots to shift the momentum in Mumbai’s favour but was dismissed soon after a missed stumping from the great MSD. Two 19-year-old amateurs, played very mature innings, stitching together a 37-run stand for the fifth wicket; Hrithik Shokeen and Tilak Varma took Mumbai to 84-4 from 47-4. MI added a few quick runs owing to some sloppy fielding and a total of 5 dropped catches from CSK with some sensible batting from Varma helping Mumbai Indians with a 150-plus score. In the last 10 overs, a total of 99 runs were scored.

If Chennai can pick wickets off the second ball of the innings, Mumbai can take a wicket off the first ball. Mumbai had the best possible start to this defence by dismissing Ruturaj Gaikwad on the very first ball. Santner who was sent ahead of Ambati Rayudu was also dismissed soon after playing a few handsome looking shots. The veterans, Rayudu and Robin Uthappa tried to rebuild the innings but Daniel Sams was the road-blocker, picking wickets at regular intervals for MI and brining them back into the game. With 17 needed off the final six, the coolest man on this planet, MS Dhoni just did what he does best, finished it off in style with 6, 4, 2 and 4 off the last four balls of the innings to win it for Chennai Super Kings to take them to four points.

Read More: IPL 2022, Most Likely Teams for Elimination: MI, CSK, DC have a mountain to climb in business end

Let’s take a look at the top three performances from the game between CSK and MI.

Mukesh Choudhary gets player of the match for his 3-19 against Mumbai Indians (Images ©BCCI/IPL)

Mukesh swings Mumbai batters back to the pavilion

Mukesh Choudhary probably had bananas and eggs for breakfast going into this match, as he was swinging the ball bananas from the very first ball, dismissing both Mumbai openers for ducks in his first over. On the very first ball of the innings, Mukesh bowled a perfect in-swinging yorker which troubled Rohit. It is a world-known fact now that Rohit Sharma, early in his innings, is weak against the in-swinging deliveries onto the pads from left-armers. Mukesh didn’t have to do much as he just followed the plan and bowled an in-swinger into Rohit’s pad. What followed was a soft dismissal, as the Mumbai captain played a nothing shot gifting his wicket for a duck on the second ball of the innings.

Mukesh, utilizing the swing offered by the new ball, clean bowled the million-dollar buy for MI, Ishan Kishan with an absolute peach of a delivery. The ball was full and swinging away from Kishan, who probably missed the line of the ball, got squared up and ended up losing his balance falling onto the knees to that 139.9 kmph out-swinging yorker. Mukesh wasn’t done yet, he then dismissed baby AB, Dewald Brevis. Choudhary saw Brevis walking down the wicket and banged it short, wide and angling across the right-hander. Brevis just threw his hands and edged it to the ever so safe, MS Dhoni who completed the formalities with the gloves. Mukesh was denied a four-fer, when Dwayne Bravo dropped a sitter in the slips, in the process letting off Varma who then went on to score a crucial fifty for Mumbai.

Choudhary utilized the new ball to the fullest, picking three wickets in two back-to-back overs and made the Mumbai batters dance to his swing tune inside the powerplay. Mukesh ended with figures of three for 19 in his three overs at an economy of just 6.30.

Read More: IPL 2022, CSK vs GT, Top Performances: Miller's superb 94*, Rashid's cameo of 40 keep GT at the top

Daniel Sams took 4-30 against Chennai Super Kings, MI lost to CSK (Images ©BCCI/IPL)

Daniel “Summons” Chennai with a four-fer

Daniel Sams, who had been leaking runs at an economy of 12.63 per over before this match, was making a comeback after being dropped for two matches. The tall Australian all-rounder picked a wicket on the very first ball of the innings and his spell, to set the tone for Mumbai’s defence. The tall left-arm seamer then dismissed Santner with a short ball which just climbed onto the batter who ended up top-edging it to Jaydev Unadkat.

Whenever Chennai built a partnership, Rohit brought on Sams and he broke the shackles with wickets! Daniel setup up Shivam Dube with a bouncer pushing the left-hander on the backfoot and then followed it up with a brilliant good length ball to pick the batter’s thick outside edge. The all-rounder was brought on again in the 15th over in search of a wicket and did just what the doctor ordered, dismissing the well-settled Ambati Rayudu who sliced a full toss to a diving Kieron Pollard at long on. Daniel picked a wicket in every over that he bowled in this match taking four crucial wickets, giving just 30 runs in his quota of four overs.

MS Dhoni scores 28 runs off the 13 balls and win the game for CSK (Images ©BCCI/IPL)

For the Kazillionth time, Dhoni finishes off in style!

There hasn’t been a better finisher in the game than Mahendra Singh Dhoni and today for the umpteenth time he proved why! At the start of the 19th over, CSK needed 28 off 12 balls, even if 1 per cent of the supporters believed in CSK, it was because of the presence of the greatest finisher ever, MSD.

Pretorius and Dhoni sensibly played out the 19th over from yorker king Jasprit Bumrah without taking much risk or rather without losing any wicket knowing that Jaydev Unadkat would be bowling the last over. With 17 runs needed off the final six, Mumbai were still favorites to win the game. Unadkat struck Pretorius right in front of the stumps to get him LBW which was wrongly judged by the field umpire at first but the decision was overturned after a successful review from Mumbai; a wicket on the very first ball of the last over swung the weight further in Mumbai’s favour. Needing 17 off 5, Bravo, who was on strike, did what was the need of the hour, took a single and brought the ‘ice cool’ Dhoni on strike. Dhoni always has had the upper hand over Unadkat scoring 83 runs off the latter’s 36 balls before this match, with a strike rate of 236.24 and being dismissed only once. Needing 16 off four balls, bowling from over the wicket angling across the right-hander, Unadkat bowled right in the slot for Dhoni to bring his fast bottom hand into the game and smashed a flat six which went into the straight sightscreen like a tracer bullet. With 10 needed off three, Unadkat erred again by bowling a slower bouncer; Dhoni hooked it with a slight top edge towards the fine leg boundary. Still CSK needed six runs off two deliveries, Unadkat followed up with a brilliant yorker at leg stump. Dhoni smartly whipped the ball towards deep mid-wicket and ran like a horse for two runs. What followed was not a surprise to the fellow MSDians who have seen this happen a lot over the past 18 years. Four needed off one ball, with heart rate of spectators and Unadkat pumping more than MSD’s strike rate, but the great man standing at the striker’s end was as cool as the protoplanetary Boomerang Nebula (the coldest object in the universe). Unadkat bowled a low full toss on MSD’s legs, since fine leg was up and Dhoni shuffled across and chopped it fine for a boundary behind deep square leg, adding another chapter to his long book of last-over finishes.

Dhoni also has the most runs in the 20th over while batting second in IPL history, having scored 250 runs at an average of 35.71 with a staggering strike rate of 287.35 which includes 23 mammoth sixes which have won many matches for CSK just like today’s game.

IPL 2022 Points Table

IPL 2022 Points Table, CSK beat Mumbai

What’s to come

Rajasthan Royals will take on Delhi Capitals on April 22 in Match 34 of Tata IPL 2022. The game will be played at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai.

Here are top twitter reactions after MS Dhoni's heroic innings against Mumbai Indians:

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