Former England captain Michael Vaughan was surprised that Mumbai Indians (MI) Rohit Sharma held back Jofra Archer for a long time while defending a below par 171 runs in their IPL 2023 opening match against Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in Bengaluru on April 2nd.
Vaughan believes that Rohit Sharma made a tactical error by not giving the new ball to Jofra Archer, who is spearheading the MI attack in absence of Jasprit Bumrah, as they looked to restrict the explosive RCB batting.
Mumbai had batted first after RCB captain Faf du Plessis wo the toss and chose to bowl and put up 171/7 thanks to Tilak Varma’s blazing 84*. The total was a slightly below par one at the M Chinnaswamy stadium which has small boundaries.
With an inexperienced Indian pace attack of a debuting Arshad Khan, Rohit Sharma decided to give the first few overs of powerplay to him and Jason Behrendorff. But Bangalore openers Virat Kohli and Faf du Plessis, went after the duo.
By the time Jofra Archer came into bowl, Du Plessis and Kohli were well set and this resulted in him bowling his four overs for 33 runs.
"I was surprised that Jofra Archer bowled the fourth. When you've got a relatively small total, I'd have Jofra on from one of the first two overs. They need to get early wickets. You have to go for your trump card, and if that's a pre-planned move that Jofra's going to bowl four and six, there's time in cricket and in T20 cricket when you've got to go against your pre-plan," Vaughan said on Cricbuzz.
Kohli played a scintillating knock of 82* off 49 balls, RCB skipper Du Plessis smashed 73 off 43 balls as RCB handed Mumbai an eight-wicket defeat in their IPL 2023 opener.
"I don't think it was easy for him [Jofra Archer] to come because they were 30/0 when he got his fist over. They are both in, got their eyes in. It's not an easy two overs to be bowling when you've got two outstanding players set. I think it'd have been better suited to bowling at the top and trying to knock one or two of them over," he added.
Archer had joined MI for a whopping sum of INR 8 crore at the IPL 2022 auction, but missed that entire season as he was recovering from his back injury.
Vaughan also said that in IPL, the pressure is different from that in international cricket.
"It's a different pressure than what you have when you go back to play for your international team. Yes, there is pressure playing for your international team, but you've got real protection around you that you know you're going to be playing a few games. Look at Harry Brook, playing for the first time in the IPL. He didn't look like the player that he had been in an England jersey for the last six months. The IPL brings a different pressure," Vaughan concluded.
