Mumbai: Former India Parthiv Patel was extremely pleased with Punjab Kings pacer Arshdeep Singh’s performance against Mumbai Indians in an IPL 2023 match and said the left-arm pacer wasn’t just bowling at the wickets, he was breaking literally them with his accurate yorkers at the Wankhede Stadium Saturday night.
Punjab Kings held their nerves to ward off a spirited challenge from the Mumbai Indians to win Match No. 31 of the TATA IPL 2023 by 13 runs.
Chasing a stiff 215 for victory, MI were restricted to 201/6 at the end of their 20 overs, thanks largely to a brilliant performance by paceman Arshdeep Singh in the last over, where he gave away only two runs and also claimed a couple of wickets.
MI needed 16 off the last over and Arshdeep on the third ball broke the middle stump in two pieces with Tilak Varma on strike. It was not a fluke, as on the next ball, he broke the middle stump once again with Nehal Wadhera on strike and evenutally emerged as the best of the PBKS bowlers returning with figures of 4-0-29-4.
PBKS now have eight points from seven games and lie fifth in the points table, while MI are in seventh place with six points after three wins and an equal number of defeats.
“Executing at the end is very important. He started off well, picking up Ishan Kishan’s wicket early off a catch. The game changed when he got Suryakumar Yadav out. He wasn’t just bowling at the wickets, he was breaking them. His yorkers were plentiful and they were also accurate. We saw two stumps break and all the spare stumps at the Wankhede were brought to the game,” said JioCinema expert Parthiv Patel.
“Arshdeep won them the match because they were giving away a lot of runs at that time. So, to bowl under pressure and see the yorkers we saw, he’s backing his skills and doing it really well,” he added.
On the other hand, former India spinner Anil Kumble also discussed the spell-binding 20th over and said that it’s not easy to consistently nail yorkers.
“He’s done that for Punjab before. He’s taken that role over the last few years, he was incredible in terms of coming in and bowling the tough overs. Today, it was tougher because they had to defend 15 runs and Tim David, who’s known to hit massive sixes, was on strike. But good for him and Punjab that he could have Tim David on the non-striker’s end for most of those balls. A fantastic effort to finish things off,” said Kumble.
“It’s not easy to consistently nail those yorkers and Tilak Varma is in the form of his life. To get him out, I know he was batting on just his fourth or fifth ball, but with a yorker, getting him out was fantastic,” he added.
Kumble also praised Sam Curran for his terrific 55 in Punjab Kings’ innings.
“In those last five overs is where I think Mumbai lost the game. Today, they gave away 96 and it’s thanks to Sam Curran, who certainly took the game away from Mumbai and that was the difference, those 15 runs at the end was the difference,” he said.
IANS