Sri Lankan all-rounder Angelo Mathews today said that misfiring Delhi Daredevils have the ability to beat formidable Mumbai Indians in their Indian Premier League match tomorrow.
Mumbai chased down a stiff 199-run target against Kings XI Punjab with 27 balls to spare at Indore last night.
“Mumbai have been playing extremely good cricket, as was the case last night (against KXIP). We certainly can beat them and we have the skill and firepower to do it,” said Mathews.
Last night’s victory was Mumbai’s fifth on the trot in six games and that has placed them at the top of the table. On the other hand, Delhi are struggling with three loses from five outings.
“If you look at the last 5-6 games Mumbai have played, they have been on a roll, home or away. It’s a tough ask but we have the firepower to do it. It’s just that we need to click,” Mathews insisted.
Sri Lanka’s limited overs skipper pointed out how the Daredevils, who have lost three games including the last two, had come close to crossing the finish line.
“All our games were very close, but could not pull it off. Next time we should be able to do it, if we come close,” he said optimistically.
Even in the previous game against the Sunrisers Hyderabad in Hyderabad, Daredevils made a brave effort to overhaul 192- run target but failed, and Mathews praised the rival bowlers.
“If you watch the last game it’s really hard to explain what went wrong. Credit should go to Bhuvi (Bhuvneshwar Kumar) and other bowlers. They bowled yorkers and did not give us anything to hit,” he said.
Mathews conceded that the team did not have sufficient big names in batting, but said Delhi were playing as a unit.
“We have not got so many superstars in our team, but we have got a good set of players who can win games and that’s all matters. We have played as a team right though. We are on the verge of winning games and I am sure we can pull it off tomorrow.”
He also said the that team had quite a few talented Indian youngsters.
“When you play competitive cricket and when you score and take wickets against international players, it shows you have something in you. In our team we have Sanju Samson, who is 22 years old, Karun Nair, Shreyas Iyer. Shahbaz (Nadeem) has been bowling well for so many seasons. The amount of talent is unbelievable,” Mathews said.
Asked about Mumbai’s death bowling specialist Lasith Malinga giving away more than 50 runs in two successive games, the fellow-Lankan said, “…anyone can have a bad day, especially in T20 cricket and it’s very difficult to be consistent throughout the long season of 14 games. Lasith has proved himself as one of the best bowlers in shorter format.
He will definitely come back.”
Mathews wished that more Lankans would turn out in IPL in the future.
“IPL is very competitive tournament. The cream of international players play here. Obviously playing competitive cricket is very good, but unfortunately not many of us are in IPL and hopefully more will be there in the coming years,” he concluded.
