Senior guys including myself need to step up: Rohit Sharma
Mumbai (PTI): Mumbai Indians captain Rohit Sharma feels that senior players, including the skipper himself, need to step up and put up an improved batting show after losing their first two IPL games.
Rohit, along with Suryakumar Yadav and Ishan Kishan, are yet to come to the party as MI lost by seven wickets to CSK here on Saturday.
"The senior guys need to step up, starting with me. We know the nature of IPL. We need to get some momentum, and if you don't it is going to be tough," Rohit said after the match.
Rohit urged his batters to try different things.
"We need to try different things, need to attack, need to be brave. We have a couple of guys who are young into the IPL. Got to give some time to them. It will take time, but we need to back them up and show enough trust in their ability."
The MI skipper feels that all is not lost.
"Just two games, not all is lost, but the senior guys need to step up with the bat. That's the nature of the tournament. If you win, you can win on the trot. If you lose, it will hamper the momentum. We wanted to do a lot of things right."
He did admit that they were at least 40 runs short of what would have been a competitive score.
"We lost our way in the middle. We did not capitalise on the start. It was a good pitch, we were 30-40 runs short in the middle. Credit to their spinners, they bowled well, kept us under pressure and we did not respond well," he said.
Let the Truth be known. If you read VB and like VB, please be a VB Supporter and Help us deliver the Truth to one and all.
Rickelton's ton in vain as SRH beat MI by 6 wickets
Mumbai (PTI): Ryan Rickelton's whirlwind unbeaten ton was overshadowed by Heinrich Klaasen's unbeaten 65 as Sunrisers Hyderabad defeated Mumbai Indians by six wickets in an IPL match here on Wednesday.
Chasing an imposing 244-run target, Travis Head (76 off 30) and Abhishek Sharma (45 off 24) shared 129 runs for the opening wicket to set the platform for SRH.
Klaasen (65 not out off 30 balls) then displayed his all-round hitting abilities to guide SRH home with the help of Nitish Kumar Reddy (21) and Salil Arora (30 not out off 10) in 18.4 overs.
Earlier, Rickelton's knock powered MI to 243 for five.
MI rode on a 93-run stand between Rickelton (123 not out off 55 balls) and Will Jacks (46 off 22) in 7.1 overs for the opening stand to power the side.
MI skipper Hardik Pandya scored a valuable 31 off 15 balls before being dismissed.
Praful Hinge (2/54), Eshan Malinga (1/29), Sakib Hasan (1/39) and Nitish Kumar Reddy (1/31) were the wicket-takers for SRH.
Brief Scores:
Mumbai Indian: 243 for 5 in 20 overs (Ryan Rickelton 123 not out; Praful Hinge 2/54).
Sunrisers Hyderabad: 249 for 4 in 18.4 overs (Travis Head 76, Heinrich Klaasen 65 not out; AM Ghazanfar 2/51).
