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IPL 2025: Mumbai Indians eliminate Gujarat Titans to set up Qualifier 2 with Punjab Kings
Strip away everything else, and you can more often than not reduce T20 contests to a simple count-off: who hit more sixes? Mumbai Indians (MI) hit 17 in the IPL 2025 Eliminator, and Gujarat Titans (GT) hit eight.
Rohit Sharma top-scored for MI with 81 off 50 balls, B Sai Sudarshan top-scored for GT with 80 off 49. The difference lay in MI’s hitting depth. Five of their batters cleared the boundary at least three times each.
This hitting depth took MI to the second-highest total in any IPL playoff game, and ensured that GT’s target always remained just out of reach, even though their chase, advantaged by dew, remained alive almost until the end.
And there was one other difference between MI and GT, a difference MI can call on against every other team in the tournament: Jasprit Bumrah. His raw figures were impressive enough – 1 for 27 in four overs – and he also produced the moment of the match, a pinpoint leg-stump yorker to bowl Washington Sundar between his legs, and end an 84-run fourth-wicket stand with Sai Sudharsan.
Bumrah followed up with an 18th over that went for just nine runs – despite containing a six – and that left GT with 36 to get off the last 12 balls. It became 24 off six after Trent Boult’s 19th over, and while it was possible – especially with Rahul Tewatia and Shahrukh Khan at the crease – it’s an equation that usually favours the bowling team.
MI’s total was built on the back of a blazing start from their new opening pair. Jonny Bairstow, replacing Ryan Rickelton who has left on international duty, smashed a 22-ball 47 on his debut for his third IPL team. Rohit, meanwhile, made his fourth fifty and highest score of the season.
MI chose to bat a day after Punjab Kings, sent in, had been bowled out for 101 at the same venue. This was a different pitch, however, with even bounce and none of the seam movement of Qualifier 1.
Even so, GT could have had MI in trouble early, only for Gerald Coetzee and Kusal Mendis – the latter making his IPL debut – to put Rohit down on 3 and 12. Within minutes, GT were firmly on the back foot, with Bairstow tonking Prasidh Krishna for 26 runs – though two of his boundaries came off the edge – in the fourth over.
Bairstow fell in the eighth over, but MI kept punching. Rohit’s use of the sweep against GT’s spinners was particularly noteworthy, bringing him 27 runs – the most he’s scored with variants of the sweep against spin in any IPL innings for which shot data is available – off just six balls.
He slowed down after reaching his half-century, only scoring 31 off his last 22 balls. Here was another parallel with Sai Sudharsan’s innings: he scored 28 off his last 21. And just like Sai Sudharsan and Washington, Rohit and Bairstow put on 84 off 44 balls.
The most ominous thing about MI’s innings was the steadily rising frequency of their six-hitting. Even though Bairstow and Suryakumar Yadav – who made his 15th successive 25-plus score in T20s – were out by then, they cleared the rope nine times in the last six overs, with Tilak Varma and Naman Dhir doing their bit before Hardik Pandya finished with three maximums off Coetze in a 22-run final over.
If GT could have done anything differently with the ball, it could have been to use the slower ball more often. Prasidh and Mohammed Siraj dismissed Rohit and Tilak in the 17th and 18th overs with skillful use of this weapon, but GT probably turned to it a little too late, and didn’t use it often enough even then.
By the time dew set in during the chase, this option was taken out of MI’s toolkit, leaving them to put their trust in on-pace yorkers and the odd hard-length ball.
GT lost Shubman Gill early, with Trent Boult striking in typical fashion – angling the ball across the right-hand batter and bending it back to trap him lbw – to pick up his 32nd first-over wicket in the IPL. Bhuvneshwar Kumar is some way behind in second place with 27.
Then Bumrah bowled a four-run first over of swing and searing pace, leaving GT 9 for 1 after two. But they quickly found their voice, with Mendis putting a shocker behind the stumps – apart from the early Rohit spill, he also dropped Suryakumar in the 12th over – behind him with a pair of big leg-side sixes off Boult in the third over, and Sai Sudharsan finding the gaps with impressive frequency while rushing past 700 – and then 750 – runs for the season.
Mendis was looking ominous on 20 off nine balls when he fell in unfortunate fashion, his back foot slipping backwards when he stepped deep in his crease to pull Mitchell Santner in the seventh over, and trampling the stumps. It portended good things for GT in a way, though, since it was an early sign of dew.
The ball certainly came onto the bat beautifully as the Sai Sudharsan-Washington partnership surged. Washington took a little while to get going – he was on 11 off nine initially – but quickly found his boundary-hitting range and began to dominate the stand. When he hit Boult for two sixes and a four in the 13th over, he was on 47 off 22, and GT needed 81 off 42.
It was at this point that Bumrah re-entered the game. The fourth ball of his third over was a candidate for the ball of IPL 2025, swerving late, homing into the base of leg stump, and Washington’s front leg opening up to try and create space for his bat to access the ball only created a channel for the ball to burst through.
It wasn’t over yet, but with Sai Sudharsan falling to Richard Gleeson – another MI debutant – in the 16th over as GT chased a boundary almost every ball, MI’s grip tightened. And with all the dew about, their execution of yorkers – they usually didn’t miss by much even when they did miss – was exemplary. Bumrah and Boult were excellent, and Gleeson bowled three hard-to-hit balls in the 20th to close it out mathematically before trudging off with a hamstring issue, but Impact sub Ashwani Kumar was just as good. The left-armer eventually had the responsibility of bowling the last three balls, and finished with 1 for 28 in 3.3 overs.
Brief scores:
Mumbai Indians 228 for 5 in 20 overs (Rohit Sharma 81, Jonny Bairstow 47, Suryakumar Yadav 33, Tilak Varma 25,Hardik Pandya 22*; Mohammed Siraj 1-37, Sai Kishore 2-42, Prasidh Krishna 2-53) beat Gujarat Titans 208 for 6 in 20 overs (B Sai Sudharsan 80,Kusal Mendis 20, Washington Sundar 48, Sherfane Rutherford 24, Rahul Tewatia 16*, M Shahrukh Khan 13; Trent Boult 2-56, Jasprit Bumrah 1-27, Richard Gleeson 1-39, Mitchell Santner 1-10, Ashwani Kumar 1-28)by 20 runs
[Cricinfo]
European leaders, including in France and Germany, have announced they are working on a plan in the event the United States follows through on its threat to take over Greenland as tensions soar.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Noel Barrot told France Inter radio on Wednesday that while nations want to act if the US moves to seize Greenland from an ally, Denmark, they want to do so “together with our European partners”.
“I myself was on the phone with the US Secretary of State Marco Rubio yesterday. He discarded the idea that what just happened in Venezuela could happen in Greenland,” Barrot said.
On Saturday, the United States – using fighter jets, attack helicopters, and special forces – abducted Venezuela’s President Nicolas Maduro, bringing him to New York City to be tried for alleged drug trafficking.
US President Donald Trump’s decision to greenlight the abduction of Maduro led to widespread condemnation and fear that Greenland, which the president has previously said should be part of Washington’s security apparatus, could be forcibly taken.
But since then, European allies have rallied behind Greenland’s sovereignty, saying the country belongs to its people.
Johannes Koskinen, chair of the Foreign Affairs Committee of Finland’s parliament, called for the issue to be raised within NATO.
“[Allies should] address whether something needs to be done and whether the United States should be brought into line in the sense that it cannot disregard jointly agreed plans in order to pursue its own power ambitions,” he said.
Denmark’s Foreign Minister Lars Lokke Rasmussen and his Greenlandic counterpart, Vivian Motzfeldt, requested an urgent meeting with Rubio to discuss the situation.
“We would like to add some nuance to the conversation,” Rasmussen wrote in a social media post. “The shouting match must be replaced by a more sensible dialogue. Now.”
Denmark has warned that any move to take Greenland by force would mean “everything would stop”, including NATO and 80 years of close security links.
Greenland’s government will join a meeting between Rubio and Danish officials next week following renewed US claims on the Arctic island, its foreign minister said on Wednesday.
The European Union will support Greenland and Denmark when needed and will not accept violations of international law no matter where they occur, European Council President Antonio Costa said.
“On Greenland, allow me to be clear: Greenland belongs to its people. Nothing can be decided about Denmark and about Greenland without Denmark or without Greenland,” Costa said in a speech.
“The European Union cannot accept violations of international law – whether in Cyprus, Latin America, Greenland, Ukraine, or Gaza. Europe will remain a firm and unwavering champion of international law and multilateralism.”
Greenland – the world’s largest island, with a population of 57,000 people – is located between Europe and North America. Since 2019, during Trump’s first term, the president has raised the idea of controlling Greenland, saying it would benifit US security.
So far, Trump has not ruled out using force to take the island.
Rubio told reporters on Wednesday that Trump’s intention is to buy Greenland. “That’s always been the president’s intent from the very beginning.”
House US House Speaker Mike Johnson said he hasn’t heard talk of sending the military into Greenland and the US is “looking at diplomatic channels”.
White House Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Trump and his national security team have “actively discussed” the option of buying Greenland.
“He views it in the best interest of the United States to deter Russian and Chinese aggression in the Arctic region. And so that’s why his team is currently talking about what a potential purchase would look like,” Leavitt told reporters.
Neither Leavitt nor Rubio ruled out the use of force. But Leavitt said, “The president’s first option, always, has been diplomacy.”
[Aljazeera]
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Landslide early warnings issued to the Districts of Badulla, Kandy, Matale and Nuwara Eliya
The Landslide Early Warning Center of the National Building Research Organisation [NBRO] has issued landslide early warnings to the districts of Badulla, Kandy, Matale and Nuwara Eliya for the next 24 hours commencing at 1200hrs today [08]
Accordingly
LEVEL II AMBER landslide early warnings have been issued to the Divisional Secretaries Divisions and surrounding areas of Ududumbara in the Kandy District, Wilgamuwa in the Matale District, and Nildandahinna and Walapane in the Nuwara Eliya District.
LEVEL I YELLOW landslide early warnings have been issued to the Divisional Secretaries Divisions and surrounding areas of Meegahakiwula, Welimada, Kandaketiya, Lunugala, Badulla, Passara, Uva Paranagama and Hali_Ela in the Badulla District, Ambanganga Korale in the Matale District, and Mathurata and Hanguranketha in the Nuwara Eliya District.
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