Sachin Tendulkar seems to have come into the ongoing edition of Indian Premier League (IPL) with a lot of bad luck. He has played three matches in the tournament so far and in all of them, he has been dismissed in unfortunate ways.
In the first match, his wicket was a result of misunderstanding between him and Ricky Ponting while running between the wickets, while, in the second game, the umpire gave him out leg before wicket when the ball had pitched slightly outside the leg stump.
Yesterday, Mumbai Indians took on Delhi Daredevils in their first home match and the stadium was completely filled. It was hard to find a spectator in the stadium who was not chanting Tendulkar’s name. They couldn’t wait to see their hero in action and they didn’t have to wait too long for that.
Mumbai batted first and Tendulkar was out there in action with Ricky Ponting. But, the crowd got stunned when both those players got out inside the first couple of overs.
Ponting went first. He came down the track against Irfan Pathan and tried to play across the line through midwicket. The ball took the leading edge of the bat and went to the fielder at mid off.
Tendulkar also departed on the third ball of the next over. Dinesh Karthik played a crisp off drive and the ball went to Mahela Jayawardena at mid off in no time.
Tendulkar tried to go for a quick single, but, Karthik didn’t move from his position. Before Tendulkar could return back to his crease, Mahela Jayawardena had already hit the stumps with a wonderful throw.
However, Despite Tendulkar’s early dismissal, Mumbai Indians put up a huge total of 209 on the board. Dinesh Karthik was the main contributor with the bat for them. He scored 86 off just 48 balls.
Mumbai Indians defended that total easily. They restricted the Daredevils to 165 in 20 overs and secured their second win in the tournament.