Courtesy: BCCI/IPL
On Thursday, May 1, Mumbai Indians (MI) crushed Rajasthan Royals (RR) by 100 runs in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 clash at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur. Karn Sharma was one of the star performers for MI with the ball, taking three wickets after being brought on as an impact substitute, playing a key role in the collective performance from the team’s batters and bowlers, which helped them reach the top of the points table for the first-time in the tournament with the business end fast approaching.
Before the bowling exploits from Karn Sharma, a lot happened in the Pink City as the MI batters dominated their way to 217/2 total in the allotted 20 overs on the back of openers Rohit Sharma and Ryan Rickelton scoring fifties before captain Hardik Pandya and vice-captain Suryakumar Yadav scoring 48 off 23 with seven boundaries each. In defense of the 217-run total, MI got the perfect start as Deepak Chahar dismissed Vaibhav Suryavanshi without troubling the scorers in the first over.
After that, Trent Boult took the key wickets of in-form Yashasvi Jaiswal and Nitish Rana before Jasprit Bumrah dismissed RR captain Riyan Parag and Shimron Hetmyer on consecutive balls, to leave the hosts five down in the first five overs. Karn Sharma was introduced into the attack in the ninth over as an impact substitute, replacing Rohit Sharma, when RR were already six wickets down.
Karn Sharma ended up with figures of 3/23 in four overs to his name for MI vs RR in IPL 2025
Karn Sharma was smashed for a six by Dhruv Jurel early, but he managed to win the battle against him on the last ball of the over, getting him to miscue a sweep shot straight into the helmet before taking the catch in the follow through as the ball ricocheted towards him. In the 12th over of the RR innings, Karn Sharma was brought back into the attack, and he started by picking up the wicket of Maheesh Theekshana, who could only top edge the pull shot straight to Suryakumar Yadav on the off side.
Although Kumar Kartikeya managed to survive the hat-trick ball from Karn Sharma, he could only hit him to the long-on region later in the over before being caught by Deepak Chahar quite a long way off the boundary rope. Jofra Archer did hit him for a four in the latter stages of his spell, but Karn Sharma ended up with figures of 3/23 in four overs to his name, playing a key role in bundling out RR for 117 runs in 16.1 overs.
