Winning the championship is important, not the first game: MI’s Rohit Sharma

By PTI
CHENNAI: Mumbai Indians captain Rohit wouldn’t mind losing another opening game as long as his team goes on to win the tournament, but admitted that they were 20 runs short against RCB in the season-opener at Chennai.

“Winning the championship is important, I guess, not the first game. It was a great fight and we didn’t let it go easily. Although the score wasn’t something we were happy with. We were 20 short,” Rohit said.

“We made some mistakes, those are bound to happen. We need to move on. When you look at the situation with four overs left they had AB and Christian, that’s why we went with Bumrah and Boult to try and get them out.

“Definitely not an easy pitch to bat on, the oddball was gripping,” he said.

The MI captain was all praise for de Villiers.

“De Villiers batted really well and got them home. We haven’t had much time together as a group and it was totally opposite in Dubai, where we began preparations a month before,” Rohit said.

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The MI skipper didn’t want to give any excuses for the defeat.

“…But that’s how the IPL has been played over the years, you just got to get in the game as quickly as possible. It can be difficult for teams that have great home records, but that is what sport is, you’ve got to go away and win. We are fortunate that we’re even on the park.”

De Villiers, whose exploits won the game for RCB, was also very pleased with his effort.

“It was an incredible game of cricket, always seems to be against Mumbai. We obviously came in knowing it wasn’t going to be easy. I knew halfway it was going to get tough, it’s one of those pitches that gets harder as the game goes on,” de Villiers said.

South African AB de Villiers rolled back the years with his beautiful yet brutal assault as Royal Challengers Bangalore pipped defending champions Mumbai Indians by two wickets in a last-ball thriller in the Indian Premier League opener here on Friday.

De Villiers smashed 48 off 27 balls after RCB were down in the dumps at 106 for 5.