IPL 2017, MI vs RCB: McClenaghan's triple-wicket final over is the SK Play of the Match

The Royal Challengers Bangalore had already been pushed out of contention for the playoffs after losing six out of their first eight matches. However, though the skipper Virat Kohli himself admitted that his team were not in the race for the playoffs, RCB were still in with a slim chance if they could manage to win all their remaining games.

Therefore, it was imperative that RCB brought their A game to this encounter against Mumbai Indians at the Wankhede.

After winning the toss and opting to bat first, openers Kohli and Mandeep Singh got off to promising starts before throwing their wickets away in quick succession. Travis Head walked in at No. 3, but his lean patch continued as he laboured to a score of 12 runs in 15 balls before hitting Krunal Pandya straight into the hands of Hardik Pandya in the deep.

AB de Villiers, at the other end, put behind his own barren run in the last few innings and raced away to 43 off just 27 balls. However, that was when the match turned on its head. De Villiers, who looked like he would run away with the game, walked back to the pavilion a couple of overs later when Krunal Pandya, his nemesis in the IPL, had him for the fourth time in four instances.

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When Shane Watson, who came in at the fall of De Villiers’ wicket, lasted only five balls and RCB slipped to 108/5, it looked like the was slipping out of their grasp.

However, Kedhar Jadhav and Pawan Negi combined in a valuable sixth wicket partnership that added 54 runs in just six overs. The pair saved RCB the blushes and lifted the score to a respectable 157 at the end of the 19th over.

Having first set up a total that was worth defending, RCB would have looked to maximise their score in the final over of the innings.

The Play of the Day: McClenaghan’s final over

Rohit Sharma handed the responsibility of bowling the crucial final over to Mitchell McClenaghan. The Kiwi had picked up the big wicket of Kohli earlier and had conceded 29 runs in his three overs.

He kept Jadhav to just one run off the first delivery of the over and followed it up with a dot ball in the next, bowling full and wide, outside Negi’s reach. Negi then muscled a length ball over the bowler and towards the straight boundary off the very next delivery.

Not perturbed by the boundary, McClenaghan slipped in a back-of-the-hand slower delivery and forced the diminutive left-hander to play a half-hearted pull into the hands of Pollard at long-on.

Off the very next ball, he bowled short and wide to Jadhav, who ran down the pitch and flat-batted the bouncer to Pollard. The West Indian pouched his second catch in as many deliveries. Sreenath Aravind was then run out off the final delivery of the over.

The Impact

In hindsight, this over bowled by McClenaghan proved to be the difference in a game that stretched into the last over. The well-set pair of Jadhav and Negi were more than capable of the big hits that would have taken RCB above 170. However, McClenaghan accounted for the wickets of both these set batsmen and gave away just five in the over. In the T20 format, a final over that yields three wickets and concedes just five runs is worth its weight in gold.