As It Happened: Rajasthan Royals vs Mumbai Indians, IPL Match 9 in Ahmedabad
Live cricket score and ball-by-ball commentary of the Indian Premier League (IPL) match 9 between Rajasthan Royals vs Mumbai Indians at the Sardar Patel Stadium, Motera, Ahmedabad on Tuesday.
Skipper Steve Smith struck his maiden IPL half-century as the young Australian led Rajasthan Royals to a comfortable seven-wicket win over Mumbai Indians in their IPL cricket match on Tuesday. Catch all the highlights of the match here: (SCORECARD | SCHEDULE | POINTS TABLE)
It was Royals' third consecutive win while Mumbai suffered their third defeat in a row.
Chasing a challenging 165 to win, Royals romped home in 19.1 overs with Smith scoring an unbeaten 79 from 53 balls.
He was well supported by Ajinkya Rahane (46) as they raised a 64-run stand for the second wicket.
Smith shifted gears at will as he first relied on finding the gaps, running hard between the wicket, and when needed, he found the boundaries effortlessly. He found the fence eight times and also smashed a six.
IPL Live Score - RR vs MI
That's all we have for today. Join us back tomorrow for the match between Delhi and Punjab at Pune at 2000 IST. Until then, it's goodbye and take care from us.
Steven Smith (Man of the Match) says that his job is to score runs and happy that he contributed for his team today. He says they tried to keep it under 10 an over. Adds that it's nice to get his first fifty. Further adds Rajasthan have started well and hopefully they can continue that.
Maximum sixes award goes to Kieron Pollard and star of the match goes to Deepak Hooda.
Rajasthan have done it and with 5 balls to spare. Superb win and the third on the trot for them. Chasing 165, Rajasthan got off to a decent start. Samson departed and from there on Rahane and Smith laid the foundation that set the match up for them. Rahane missed out on his fifty but the run machine Smith went on and took his side to yet another win. He played a captain's knock and looked very fluent in his stroke play. It was a Steve Smith story all the way. Vinay Kumar, Malinga and Gopal each picked up a wicket but failed to create any real impact towards the outcome of the match.
Short and around off, punched to covers and they set off for a run. The throw comes in at the non-striker's end as Gopal clips the bails off. The decision has been taken upstairs. Replays show that Faulkner with a full stretched dive gets his bat just about in. That's it, Rajasthan have done it as they have beaten Mumbai by 7 wickets.
Gopal to bowl the last over.
FOUR! Classy shot! You just cannot stop this man as he fires this like a tracer bullet to the covers fence for a boundary.
Yorker on middle, Smith keeps it back to the bowler.
Pitched up on off, driven straight to covers.
Slower ball on middle, Smith pulls it to square leg for a couple.