The spinner was expected to determine the condition of the Ferozeshah Kotla ground here after two days of wear and tear on the pitch. Instead, it was Sailor who stole the show in the morning and made a big impact on the state of the game.
Tall, his Divij Mehra showed incredible control, dropping the ball in the same spot all morning. After getting ready, several deliveries came sharply into the right-hander, and his spell shattered Mumbai’s top orders, with batsmen unable to negotiate sharp moves.
The batter is sandwiched between a rock and a hard surface:
While preparing for the straight-ahead delivery, the hitter failed to manage a sharp move, but Armaan tried to prepare for the move, pushing Jafar back into the delivery immediately following the pitch.
Plansh his Vijaylan scored a valuable run in the first hour and out of the five boundaries he made up three of them with drives, pulls and third man his dubs. This extended Delhi’s first inning lead to 76. of defeat. Opener Musheer Khan was his first victim. The ball landed long enough, struck sharply and hit the batsman’s pad before ricocheting off the stumps. In the next inning Jafar pushed back from the off stump to a throw that landed a good length. The ball flew straight, but Jafar seemed to have two things in mind, and he calmly put down his racket.
All eyes were on Sarfaraz Khan, who scored a century in the first innings. Will he dig Mumbai out of the hole again? A right-hander could not hit and parry an incoming low-held delivery. After three overs, No. 6 Prasad Pawar let go of a shot from Vijayran and lost outside the stumps.
Mumbai is 5 points behind, but still 39 points behind. Ajinkya Rahane, Shams Mulani and Tanush Kotian put up resistance, but it wasn’t enough to turn the tide. Mehra says of the morning spell:
“I tried to follow the instructions of the captain and the coaches. They expected me to stick to a tight line as they expected the Mumbai batsman to make a run on his third day and take the overall win. I said