Have sympathy for Hardik and the questions he had to answer later: AB de Villiers

Hardik, who was frustrated, brought up MI’s inability to protect the total. He brought up the choice to keep Jasprit Bumrah out until the eighteenth over.

Mumbai Indians (MI) lost to Punjab Kings (PBKS) by five wickets in Qualifier 2, eliminating their hopes of winning a record-extending sixth IPL championship. While MI captain Hardik Pandya accepted responsibility for the defeat, former South African captain AB de Villiers defended the losing captain by claiming that MI was outperformed by batting genius.

The Mumbai Indians scored a huge 203 for 6 in a rain-delayed knockout match in Ahmedabad because to impressive efforts from Suryakumar Yadav (44 off 26), Tilak Varma (44 off 29), and Naman Dhir (37 off 18). In response, PBKS, who were pursuing 204, accomplished an unprecedented achievement against MI in IPL history by successfully chasing a total of 200 or more.

After 11 arduous years, the franchise reached their second IPL final thanks to Shreyas Iyer’s undefeated 87 off 41 balls. Josh Inglis and Nehal Wadhera provided solid support for the right-handed batsman. After Pandya accepted responsibility for the defeat, AB de Villiers defended him.

“I sympathise with Hardik and the subsequent questions he had to answer.

Being a captain is difficult because it involves a lot of emotion. Admitting that things didn’t go as planned is never easy, and I know because I’ve been there. However, I disagree with the critique. They were outplayed when bowling and had a par score when batting. You want to bowl 120 perfect yorkers, of sure, but no team is flawless. The difference was made in part by Josh Inglis and in part by Shreyas Iyer. “The beauty of cricket is that it outperformed them,” he stated on JioStar.

“If we had to do anything better, it would have been to bowl the correct lengths or the right bowler at the right moment. I won’t put it on the wicket. I prefer to do everything myself, and perhaps I could have done a better job of leading my people. In the post-match interview, Pandya stated, “I think it was par, but it needed great execution as a bowling unit, matters in a big game, they were really calm, put us under pressure, and we couldn’t execute.”