A solid recovery with the bat. A solid recovery with the ball. But given how far we’d fallen in both powerplays, while batting and bowling, it wasn’t enough. There was no shortage of effort though, fighting right until the end. So here’s how the game went..

The case of faulty powerplays

We’ve tried a few opening combos this season, but unfortunately, it hasn’t fired. Both our openers today fell early with the ball nipping around in the first few overs, leading to some cautious batting and just 23 runs coming off the powerplay. With the ball in the second innings, the Delhi Capitals’ openers got off to a flier, getting 57 in their powerplay, again, something that caught up with us in the end.

Nat – bats, bowls, hand-balls

There’s nothing she cannot do. We know that. We’ve seen enough of it over the last four years. She was the glue with the bat tonight, first with Harmanpreet Kaur (41 off 33), steadying the ship and then going on the offensive in the second half of her innings to finish with a 45-ball 65, lifting MI to 154/5 in their 20 overs.

Now onto her ‘Hand of Nat’ moment. At the 16^th over stage, DC were kind of cruising along at 118/2 with Laura Wolvaardt and Jemimah Rodrigues looking set. We needed a miracle. Turn to Nat. As Jemimah smashed a ball straight back down the pitch, Nat just stuck her palm out, and the ball deflected off it to hit the non-striker’s stumps with Laura out of her ground. We’d got our foot back in. #JustNatThings

Starring on debut

Both Rahila Firdous and Vaishnavi Sharma had outings to remember. Vaishnavi, coming into the squad as a replacement for Kamalini G, was brough on after a powerplay that leaked runs, and immediately got rid of the dangerous Shafali Verma with a straighter delivery that knocked out leg-stump. Overall too, she brought MI back in command with her miserly spell of 4-0-20-1. Rahila, coming in as the ‘keeper, showed real quick hands and game awareness to whip the bails off a ball down leg to strangle Lizelle Lee, who was going strong on 46 off 28 balls.

Sadly, it wasn’t to be. Jemimah played a brilliant innings to see the Capitals home.

The next two remaining games become really crucial now for us. But there shouldn’t be panic bells ringing here, as four out of the five teams are currently on four points. We can keep calm, Paltan. We have six days now to re-gather ourselves and recover before our next game. It could be just the distraction we need to get back on track as we hit the ground running..