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IPL 2017: Rohit Sharma says it's important for any team to have young players like Nitish Rana, Hardik Pandya

New Delhi: In a thrilling contest, Mumbai Indians defeated Kolkata Knight Riders by four wickets in the seventh match of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2017 played at Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai to register their first win of the tournament.

While the stars in the Mumbai batting line-up failed to live upto the expectations, it was Nitin Rana and Hardik Pandya who guided their team to a sensational win over Gautam Gambhir’s men.

Rana smashed 50 off 29 balls before Pandya came up with a 29-run cameo off 11 balls to seal a thrilling four wicket win over Kolkata Knight Riders.

After the match, Mumbai captain Rohit Sharma was full of praise for the two youngsters who held their nerves under enormous pressure.

“Here at Wankhede, we back our players to get the runs with the dew coming in and the flat pitch. We were hoping Rana and Hardik would finish it off and they did. It’s important for any team to have young players come in like that and finish the job. I hope they repeat it,” he said.

At one stage, KKR looked all set to win the match but some poor fielding towards the end cost them the match.

Rohit further added that there was always room for improvement and Mumbai need to put their act together before their next match.

“There’s still room for improvement. We don’t want to be in the back seat. We know the things we didn’t do well today and we’ll go back to the drawing board before our next game,” he added.

MI needed 49 runs off the last three overs and the 18th over by Boult swung the game their way as he was hit for two sixes, one each by Rana and Pandya, conceding 19 runs that brought down the run rate.

Although Rana departed in the penultimate over from Ankit Rajpoot after reaching his 50 in 28 balls, Pandya struck Rajpoot for a six to bring down the equation to eleven from six balls.

He then rode his luck in the final over in which there was a misfield that got him a four and then the dropped catch reprieved him before he hit the winning four.

Source: Zee News