Shreyas Iyer and Shivam Dube played pivotal roles in Mumbai's 7-run victory over Himachal Pradesh in the Vijay Hazare Trophy. It proved to be Mumbai's fifth victory in six games as they continued to be one of the most in-form teams in the tournament. The match was delayed by a lot of time due to dense fog surrounding the stadium and it was eventually played as a 33-over-a-side game.
After being invited to bat first, Mumbai didn't have a great start as Yashasvi Jaiswal lost his wicket cheaply for 15 runs to Vaibhav Arora in the fifth over. The crease was then occupied by brothers Musheer and Sarfaraz Khan. Though the partnership looked to be promising at first, but the latter got dismissed for 21 runs. Next came Shreyas Iyer, who had been handed Mumbai's captaincy ahead of the game after Shardul Thakur got ruled out of the remainder of the tournament due to a calf injury.
Musheer and Iyer formed a solid stand and both of them looked to be in fine touch at the middle. The former eventually reached his half-century as the team cruised past the 100-run mark. Musheer looked set to play a big knock, but his stay was brought to an end by Kushar Pal for 73 runs. Iyer was then joined by Suryakumar Yadav at the crease and the two took Mumbai over the 200-run mark.
Iyer's splendid knock on return
Iyer proved to be the aggressor among the two and went on to bring up a valiant fifty on his return to competitive cricket. Suryakumar's batting woes continued and he got dismissed for 24 runs in the 24th over as Mumbai went down to 202/4. Iyer was sent back to the pavilion just two overs later for a well-played knock of 82. Cameos from Dube (20), Hardik Tamore (19*) and Sairaj Patil (25) pushed the team to a total of 299/9 at the end of 33 overs. Vaibhav, Abhishek Kumar and Kushar Pal took three scalps each as HP capped off a brilliant bowling display.
In reply, HP got off to the worst start possible as they lost both of their openers for ducks in the very first over. The duo of Pukhraj Mann and Ankush Bains provided much-needed stability to the team and formed an important partnership. The former soon reached his half-century but was eventually dismissed for 64 by Dube. Bains also couldn't continue for long either as he lost his wicket three overs later to Musheer for 53 runs.
The match went down to the wire
After being restricted to 139/5 at one stage, Mayank Dagar and Amanpreet Singh led HP's fightback and formed a crucial 92-run stand. It looked like they would help the side in crossing the finish line, but there was a twist in the tale as Sairaj Patil got rid of Amanpreet for 42 in the 26th over. He also got Dagar's wicket for 64 in the 30th over before Dube stepped up big time and took the remaining three wickets to finish with figures of 4/68. This saw Mumbai bowl out HP for 292 runs in 32.4 overs and win the game in thrilling fashion.