Vadodara (Gujarat) [India], January 21 : Following her side's loss to Delhi Capitals (DC), Mumbai Indians (MI) head coach Lisa Keightley admitted that the team's batting in the powerplay has not clicked, and it has put pressure on the middle-order batters to fire big runs.
The defending champions continued their slump in the ongoing WPL edition. After starting with a loss to Royal Challengers Bengaluru (RCB), MI bounced back with a couple of wins, but since then, it has been in a downward slump, with two losses to UP Warriorz and a loss to DC on Tuesday.
In these losses, MI struggled to get a good opening partnership. In the first match against UPW, they did get a 43-run opening stand, with Amanjot Kaur doing most of the attacking, but in the next two losses, they lost two wickets by the end of the powerplay. The opening mainstay, Hayley Matthews (22, 13 and 12) has failed to fire as per expectations after return from injury. In her absence, MI played G Kamalini and Amelia Kerr at the top in the first two matches, but they failed. Since her return, Matthews has been paired with G Kamalini and Sajeevan Sajana, but neither pairing has yielded the expected returns as opening pairs.
Speaking about her team's poor performances in the powerplay, Lisa said during the post-match presser, as quoted by the team's official website, "In the powerplay with the bat, we have not clicked. Obviously, we have tried a few combinations with Hayley (Matthews) being injured at the start of the competition. We did not get off to the start we wanted to in the power play, and then found it hard to go, and have always been behind where we would want to be at that stage."
"It puts a lot of pressure on our middle order coming in. Losing the toss and batting first, I think Delhi bowled really well up front in the powerplay, attacked the stumps and made it really hard to score. They got two wickets early and put pressure on our middle order to rebuild. I think we did not do enough runs. 25-30 runs short, I would say," she added.
Lisa also added that the team has been carrying injuries, with Hayley having injured her quadricep coming into the tournament and Amelia taking the opening spot, and Kamalini, who also got injured, faced a "loss of confidence" to get going in the powerplay, After a promising 28-ball 32 in the opener, she could make just 43 runs in the next four games.
"We have had to have batters up in the power play that probably, if we were fully fit and we started the competition with Hayley there opening, we would not have seen as many changes. We are working hard to try to get that combination going. We tried to play Sajana there (opening) in the last two games. We desperately want one thing to click and get us a good start," she added.
Lisa also said that Kamalini is nursing a shoulder injury, which is "enough to rule her out of the competition."
She also lamented the fact that the team has not bowled well in the powerplay, despite the presence of world-class bowlers/all-rounders like Shabnim Ismail, Nat Sciver Brunt, and players like Nicola Carey etc.
"I am not too sure what to put it down to. A lot of the bowlers are world-class bowlers. Inside the powerplay, Shabnim (Ismail) has bowled well. This year, we have had struggles with five overseas players who have been playing really well and working out those combinations. Unfortunately, Nic (Carey) had to go off. She's got a niggle, and we have to see the extent of that. I think she did that through batting today. While bowling, she was carrying the injury from batting. But we did not execute with the ball today," she said.
"Shafali (Verma) and Lizelle (Lee) are both powerful batters, and if you miss slightly, batting second with the dew, you go to the boundary. We were unable to bowl and contain consistently, and we gave far too many boundaries in the powerplay," she added.
She put down NZ all-rounder Amelia Kerr, missing the game due to the team's thinking that the slow-left-arm spin of Vaishnavi Sharma would be much more effective with the dew coming in during the second innings.
DC won the toss and elected to field first. After being reduced to 21/2 in 4.1 overs, MI were pulled out of the trouble by fine knocks from Nat Sciver-Brunt (65* in 45 balls, with six fours and two sixes) and skipper Harmanpreet Kaur (41 in 33 balls, with seven fours), who had a 78-run partnership for the third wicket. MI posted 154/5 in 20 overs, with spinner Shree Charani (3/33) was the top bowler for DC.
DC started off the chase with a strong 63-run stand between Shafali Verma (29 in 24 balls, with six fours), who became the fourth player to complete 1,000 WPL runs and Lizelle Lee (46 in 28 balls, with seven fours and a six). Skipper Jemimah Rodrigues (51* in 37 balls, with five fours and a six) finally broke her run drought, winning the match for her team with seven wickets and an over left.
DC is at the fourth spot with two wins and three losses, with four points. MI stays at second despite having lost one match more than DC due to superior net-run-rate.