Head shines on debut but Mumbai claim win

The match in a tweet:  Travis Head shines on debut for RCB but Rohit, Pollard too good as the Mumbai Indians claim a six-wicket win

The hero: Who else but the Mumbai skipper?  Season after season, Rohit Sharma continues to produce innings at the start that paves way for a Mumbai win. Once again here it was his imperious touch at the start that gave Mumbai the platform to chase down 170 with relative easy.  Rohit barely hit a ball in anger but still managed to hit seven boundaries through pure timing on his way to 62 from 44 balls. Despite being dismissed in 13th over, Rohit had swayed the match in Mumbai's favour.

The support cast: With the score on 1-89 at the half-way mark of Royal Challengers Bangalore's innings a well set AB de Villiers (29) and Virat Kohli (33) at the crease it was looking ominous for Mumbai. Step in Krunal Pandya. The left-arm spinner bowled a golden over by first having Kohli caught at mid-off and then produced a gem to spin one past the outside edge of de Villiers, to have the South African stumped.

The consolation effort: Travis Head’s brute power lightened up the Wankhede Stadium as he struck two enormous sixes and two thumping boundaries to finish as Bangalore top run scorer with 37 from 22. Given the task of resurrecting the innings at 4-99 after the loss of de Villers and Kohli in quick succession, Head had a nervy beginning, scoring just three in his first nine balls, before exploding to clobber 34 from his next 13. Despite the team loss it was a terrific IPL debut for Head.

The stat: Rohit Sharma averages 6.1 when Mumbai has batted first this season while his average batting second is a staggering 146.

The moment:  First ball after the powerplay, de Villiers hit the ball to midwicket and took off for a quick single, only to realise half way down that his partner, Kohli, had remained still at the non-strikers end.  Fortunately for de Villiers, Rohit Sharma who had intercepted the ball with a full length dive threw the ball to the bowler's end.  To compound Mumbai's error, Harbhajan took a crucial extra second to realise that de Villiers was so far down the pitch. By the time he threw to the keeper the South African had made his ground.  It is the sort of mistake with the star-studded RCB batting line-up that could turn a match. Luckily for Mumbai it didn’t cost them too much.

The celebration:  It is not often you dismiss de Villiers and Kohli in the space five balls, so when Krunal Pandya got the latter stumped of the last ball of his second over he decided to take his celebration to a new level. First, he jumped with both his feet in the air and then proceeded to do a lap around the stadium, jumping around like a mad man.  A bear hug from Kieron Pollard was as much congratulatory as it was to hold down his wildly celebrating teammate.

The next stop: Bangalore will now travel west on the Mumbai-Pune Expressway to tackle the Rising Supergiants on Friday while Mumbai head to the capital to play the Daredevils on Saturday.