Punjab Kings 198 for 3 in 16.3 overs (Prabhsimran 80*, Shreyas 66) beat Mumbai Indians 195 for 6 (De Kock 112*, Dhir 50, Arshdeep 3-22) by seven wickets

An injury to Rohit Sharma opened the door for de Kock to play his first match of this season and become only the third batter to score a century for three different IPL teams. He scored 112 off 60 balls, Naman Dhir was promoted to No. 4 and scored 50 off 31, but the rest of the MI innings never got going.

Iyer scored an equally important 66 off 35, his third consecutive half-century, starting with a four first ball when MI had taken two quick wickets.

Arshdeep sets the tone

Arshdeep came into the match with two wickets and an economy rate of 10.6 in four games this season. Two left-hand openers were the ideal setting for him to improve his performance. The new ball swung in the air and moved off the surface, and Arshdeep kept taking it away from Ryan Rickelton. He beat the bat three times in the first over. In his second, he bowled a wobble-seam ball that ended up on the pads, but Rickelton found deep square leg to perfection.

Arshdeep backed Suryakumar Yadav to walk out expecting movement from left to right, but he angled the seam away, drew a thick edge and doubled his season’s wickets tally in two balls, and also went past 100 IPL wickets.

De Kock, Dhir rescue MI

Even before those two wickets, de Kock signalled dangerous intent with a silken, aerial extra-cover drive first ball off fellow South African Marco Jansen. In Jansen’s next over, Yuzvendra Chahal lost the ball in the lights and missed a sitter from Naman Dhir. In the last over of the powerplay, de Kock gave up on making his ground but Iyer missed the stumps from mid-off.

That drop wasn’t the last error Chahal made. He started his spell by searching and frequently over-pitching and ended up conceding five sixes in his three overs for 45. Dhir hit two of those, the one over extra cover the highlight of his innings.

By the time de Kock got to fifty, MI looked set for a total in excess of 200. From 97 for 2 in 10 overs, de Kock went up a gear even as Dhir caught up with him. At 125 for 2 in 12 overs, PBKS were looking at a challenging target.

PBKS bowlers fight back

The comeback for PBKS began with Jansen conceding just seven in the 13th over, but like in the game against Sunrisers Hyderabad, the lack of pace from Shashank Singh once again produced a game-changing wicket. In his 31-ball 50, Dhir evoked a lot of Hardik Pandya with a compact bat swing and shots that looked quite like the MI captain’s. Pandya himself, though, hardly got anything out of the middle of the bat. He eventually fell for 14 off 12 to what could well end up as the catch of the tournament.

Iyer didn’t even get his name on the scoreboard for this effort at long on: he went full length as he leaped to rein the ball in, caught it in his left hand while airborne, transferred it to his right even as he came down over the boundary, and managed to throw it to Xavier Bartlett before he touched ground.

With the ball reversing, Jansen and Arshdeep bowled excellent yorkers, going for eight and nine in overs 18 and 19. Sherfane Rutherford got four tailing pinpoint yorkers during his five-ball stay for one run. Only 70 came in the last eight, prompting Dhir to say during the innings break that MI were 20 runs short.

Ghazanfar gives MI hope

The way Priyansh Arya and Prabhsimran tucked into some buffet bowling from Deepak Chahar, it looked like 195 was not 20 short but 40. However, led by Jasprit Bumrah who bowled four straight dots to Arya, Ghazanfar ended up with two wickets in the powerplay: Arya caught at midwicket and Cooper Connolly caught behind.

Prabhsimran, Iyer kill the chase

There was a time when MI had strung together 10 balls for one run and a wicket across the second and third overs of the chase. Prabhsimran cut the 11th for a regulation catch to backward point but Bumrah, wicketless in six straight IPL matches now, dropped it.

When Connolly fell, MI were still hopeful of a comeback. Iyer, though, brought a sense of calm, playing Ghazanfar’s mystery spin like you would offspin. He cover-drove the first ball he faced for four, and PBKS never looked back.

Prabhsimran faced just six balls in the first five overs, which means he did most of the damage with the field spread out. It started when Chahar came back to bowl the eighth over. Prabhsimran charged at him to hit a 90-metre six over wide long-off before tucking one off the hip for four.

Now Prabhsimran began to dominate the strike and the scoring, bringing up his fifty with successive fours off Shardul Thakur in just 23 balls.

Bumrah might be wicketless but his bowling has been good through the season. However, when Iyer pulled him for a disdainful six in the 13th over, it was all over for MI. If there were any doubts remaining with 50 needed off the last seven overs, Prabhsimran dispelled them with a four and a six off Pandya. The end was swift and brutal with even Bumrah finishing with 0 for 41 in his four overs.