<img title="Mumbai Indians captain Rohit Sharma celebrates after beating Gujarat Lions by six wickets in the Indian Premier League at Wankhede Stadium yesterday. Pic/Suresh Karkera" src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/2017/apr/17rohitsharmaipl.jpg" alt="Mumbai Indians captain Rohit Sharma celebrates after beating Gujarat Lions by six wickets in the Indian Premier League at Wankhede Stadium yesterday. Pic/Suresh Karkera" />Mumbai Indians captain Rohit Sharma celebrates after beating Gujarat Lions by six wickets in the Indian Premier League at Wankhede Stadium yesterday. Pic/Suresh Karkera
Delhi boy Nitish Rana's 53 and skipper Rohit Sharma's unbeaten 40 helped Mumbai Indians (MI) to beat Gujarat Lions by six wickets while chasing 176 at the Wankhede Stadium yesterday.
<img src="http://images.mid-day.com/images/2017/apr/17Rana.jpg" alt="" /> Nitish Rana
MI top the table thanks to their four wins in five matches. Rana, who scored 50 off 29 balls and played a vital role in the four-wicket win against Kolkata Knight Riders at the same venue on April 9, was lucky when he was dropped by Jason Roy off pacer Basil Thampi at short mid-wicket when he was on nine and his team's total on 11. But, he didn't prevent that chance to affect him as he raced to a 33-ball half-century with a square cut boundary off left-arm spinner Ravindra Jadeja. MI reached the three-figure mark in the 12th over of the innings, bowled by pacer Munaf Patel but lost Jos Buttler (26) and Kieron Pollard (39) before Rohit took the charge and finished the game with three balls to spare. It was the two-time champions' fourth successive win in this edition of the tournament.
Pollard cracks whip Pollard, the match-winner against RCB last week, scored 39 in 23 balls with the help of two boundaries and three sixes. Rohit, who was struggling for form, played a sensible knock to stay unbeaten on 40 off 29 balls (3x4, 1x6), said: "I was trying to play with the spin, but these guys were bowling googlies, so I had to play against it. It's a challenging tournament and bowlers will keep challenging you every now and then. You have to be prepared for them. I went back to the drawing board and saw what went wrong (in earlier innings) so today I decided to play straight. Luckily, they had only one spinner."
Sloppy cricket Gujarat Lions' assistant coach Mohammad Kaif said that Rana's dropped catch made a big difference.
"That catch made a big difference because Rana has been in a good form. You are always on top when you get back-to-back wickets. That hurt quite badly," said Kaif, who also rued seamer Praveen Kumar's seven wide balls.
"You want to reduce all extras &ndash; wide balls, no balls. People are trying to help you out to reduce those extra runs, but that's the game sometimes. I am sure Praveen won't be happy."
Earlier, riding on two brilliant knocks from opener Brendon McCullum (64) and No. 5 batsman Dinesh Karthik (48 not out) Gujarat Lions put a respectable l76 for four in the allotted 20 overs.
The former New Zealand skipper had six hits to the fence and three over the ropes during his 44-ball stay at the crease.

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Pollard, the match-winner against RCB last week, scored 39 in 23 balls with the help of two boundaries and three sixes. Rohit, who was struggling for form, played a sensible knock to stay unbeaten on 40 off 29 balls

IPL 2017: Mumbai Indians skipper Rohit Sharma is back!

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IPL 2017: Mumbai Indians skipper Rohit Sharma is back!

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