Rajasthan Royals took the cricketing world by storm after being led to the title by Shane Warne in the very first season. Not many had given them a chance, but the young blood in their team coupled with the experience of their veterans was the perfect cocktail of team balance they needed.

Defending champions Mumbai Indians had had an abysmal start to the season thus far. The impeccable balance that they prided so much just stopped working. Familiar nemesis CSK had stolen a win from them in the first game and they seemed to have never recovered from that blow.

Understandably then, they had a lot at stake here. On an uncharacteristically slow difficult batting surface, Rohit Sharma elected to bat first so that his bowlers could take advantage of the large boundaries later on.

Opener Evin Lewis was out for another golden duck on the fourth ball and MI found themselves in a familiar situation. As irony would have it, young guns Suryakumar and Ishan took over and for as long as the two of them were on the crease, RR didn’t get a sniff in.

The middle overs were where they thrived, scoring at a run rate of more than 10 on a tough pitch. 14 overs and 129 runs later, Kishan finally got out playing a ramp shot. MI looked all but set for a total in excess of 190.

Jofra Archer wouldn’t let them have their way. Unadkat helped dislodge Surya from the crease exactly six balls later and captain Rohit was run out by Rahane in the same over. With the wickets of the Pandya brothers and McClenaghan, Archer sent their famed middle order packing and thus broke MI’s back.

From the last 35 balls, MI could only manage 37 runs. The bowlers had done their job- now it was up to the batsmen, who frankly made a mess of the situation.

In the entire Royals’ lineup, only Samson and Stokes’ batting gave any semblance of a partnership on the pitch. Tripathi went in the 3rd over and Rahane in the 6th. The problem with their innings was that most of the time was spent building it, but they never did take off.

Stokes’ wicket in the 15th over opened the floodgates. From 110-2, the Royals crumbled down to 125-6. The equation swung wildly in MI’s favour and for all their might, this one seemed a little out of the remaining batsmen’s pay grade.

43 from 17 was reduced to 28 from 12 with a six and a four versus Mustafizur. That seemed more manageable. On came Bumrah, one of the world’s best. He had given just the one run in his previous over. Rohit Sharma was going for the kill. Instead, Gowtham put his head down and took a mammoth 18 runs from him.

10 from 6. This could go either way. First ball, wicket- the balance swung in Mumbai’s favour. Second ball- four, Royals still hung on to the sliver of hope. Third ball- dot, this was still anyone’s game. Fourth ball- out came the money shot.

It was a six over midwicket that sealed a sensational win for the Royals. Few could believe what they were watching. Gowtham had snatched victory from the jaws of defeat and fetched his team crucial points. Mumbai had lost yet another close game with no end to their misery in sight.