IPL 2021: Kieron Pollard upbeat despite MI lose to CSK – We have 6 more games to go

Mumbai Indians’ stand-in captain Kieron Pollard sounded upbeat despite losing the opening game of the UAE leg of Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021 to Chennai Super Kings in Dubai. Mumbai Indians are in danger of slipping out of the top 4 of the points table after losing their 4th match of the season.

Mumbai Indians are hanging onto the 4th spot on the IPL 2021 points table despite the 20-run defeat to Chennai Super Kings. They need to win at least 4 of their remaining 6 games to make it to the play-offs of the 14th season.CSK vs MI: IPL 2021 Report | HighlightsMumbai Indians fell well short of a 157-run target as Saurabh Tiwary waged a lone battle with his 8th IPL fifty. But it was not enough as Deepak Chahar (2/19) and Dwayne Bravo (3/27) ran through the Mumbai Indians batting unit that did not have Rohit Sharma and Hardik Pandya with both their star players resting for the resumption of the season.Kieron Pollard threatened to do what he did a few months ago against CSK in New Delhi but Josh Hazlewood got the big wicket in the 14th over.”We needed one guy to bat deep. We had a couple of soft dismissals. We can’t let that happen at this level, but we still have six games to go,” Pollard said.Pollard conceded that Mumbai Indians gave a bit too many in the end overs as CSK collected 69 runs in the last 5 overs. CSK were reduced to 24 for 4 at the end of the powerplay but Ruturaj Gaikwad came up with a classy innings (88 not out) to help them post 156 on the board in the quota of 20 overs.”We must have got a partnership. You can do a lot of things differently in hindsight. Losing by 20 runs, I think that is the difference. Gave too many with the ball at the end. Their batters tried to continue the momentum throughout, we didn’t do that. We could have learnt from their mistake of losing too many wickets in the powerplay,” Pollard added.Always a good feeling to win against MI: BravoMeanwhile, Dwayne Bravo said he was happy to contribute with both the bat and the ball against their arch-rivals Mumbai Indians. The West Indies star took 3 wickets and hit a quickfire 23 from just 8 balls.Bravo’s late flourish helped CSK post a competitive total which in the end proved too much for Mumbai on a two-paced pitch in Dubai.”It’s a good feeling, obviously against MI it’s the toughest team in IPL and it’s like a final playing them, always a good feeling to win. Just tried to protect myself in the last stages of CPL and when I came over here, just had one bowling session which was yesterday and happy to get 4 overs through today.”Now I bat lower down the order with the batting line-up like CSK, for me it’s just about trying to get the momentum and try to capitalize, adjust and adapt. Just try to give the best of my ability whenever I go out to bat,” Bravo added.