IPL 2021: ‘Fixing’ – MI vs SRH match trends for all the wrong reasons

The defending champions Mumbai Indians (MI) were off to a great start in a must-win encounter against Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) in match 55 of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021. 

Batting first, Mumbai Indians amassed 83-1 on the board at the end of the mandatory powerplay overs. Young wicket-keeper Ishan Kishan continued with his swashbuckling form from the last game as he went on to smash 84 runs off just 32 deliveries, including 11 fours and 4 sixes. 

For information, the MI Paltan needs to win by at least 171 runs to go past Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR)’s Net Run Rate of +0.587 and hence their batters came out all guns blazing.

Reacting to this fiery start, several social media users accused the Mumbai Indians of fixing the game against Sunrisers Hyderabad. Moreover, this isn’t the first time when such claims have been made against the Mukesh Ambani-owned franchise. 

The netizens even raised the point of SRH’s main batter and skipper Kane Williamson and lead pacer Bhuvneshwar Kumar not playing on Friday. However, Hyderabad’s stand-in skipper Manish Pandey cleared that the duo had last-minute niggles which resulted in their absence. 

“My first game as IPL captain. Last-minute call. Kane had a niggle on his elbow, Bhuvi has a niggle too. We would have batted first too. We will look to bowl first and look to give Bombay a little chance. I know they are going to come to all guns blazing but we are ready,” Pandey said during the toss time.

Twitter reactions on MI’s fireworks against SRH

Here are some of the top tweets from the MI vs SRH clash in IPL 2021:

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