On May 9, Tuesday, Mumbai Indians (MI) and Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) faced off in the 54th match of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2023 at Mumbai’s Wankhede Stadium.
After winning the toss, Mumbai captain Rohit Sharma elected to bowl first. RCB skipper Faf du Plessis and Glenn Maxwell formed an impressive partnership, leading their team to a total of 199 in 20 overs. MI’s Jason Behrendorff took three wickets, while Cameron Green, Chris Jordan, and Kumar Karthikeya took one wicket each.
During MI’s chase, Rohit Sharma and Ishan Kishan made a solid start. However, RCB’s Wanindu Hasaranga dismissed both openers in the same over. Hasaranga first claimed the wicket of Ishan Kishan, who scored 42 runs off 21 balls, as the batter edged the ball to wicketkeeper Anuj Rawat.
Rohit Sharma was dismissed for just seven runs when Hasaranga trapped him LBW, even though it was initially given not-out by the umpire. The TV replay confirmed that the ball was hitting the stumps, and Rohit’s reaction went viral on social media.
The dismissal was quite controversial as another angle of the dismissal showed that Rohit Sharma had come out long and the height of the ball was on his thigh high, which would eventually likely to go on to miss the stumps.
The rules also say that Rohit Sharma was not out. According to cricket’s 3 metre rule, a batsman, if is 3 metres away from the wicket to crease, the batsman should be declared not out.
Throughout the ongoing IPL edition, Rohit Sharma has been struggling with his batting form. His highest score in the IPL 2023 was 65 runs against the Delhi Capitals (DC), where MI won by six wickets.
For his match-winning innings, he was awarded the Player of the Match title. Rohit Sharma has only managed to score 191 runs from 11 matches with an average of 17.36 and a strike rate of 124.84. In MI’s last five matches, he has only scored single-digit scores, including two ducks.