Mumbai Indians (MI) succumbed to a 12-run defeat against Lucknow Super Giants (LSG) in Match 16 of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2025 season at the Ekana Cricket Stadium on Friday (April 4).

LSG racked up 203/8 on the board, but the five-time champions failed to chase the target as they were restricted to 191/5.

During MI’s chase, Tilak Varma became just the fourth batter to be retired out in an IPL innings. The southpaw’s 23-ball 25 was off the pace as Mumbai tried to chase down a massive target. He played second fiddle during Suryakumar Yadav’s 43-ball 67 but failed to shift gears once the latter departed.

After the game, MI head coach Mahela Jayawardene reflected on the decision, calling it an ‘unfortunate but tactical’ requirement.

“Tilak batted well for us when we lost that [third] wicket, and [built] that partnership with Surya. He wanted to get going but just couldn’t. He waited till the last few overs hoping; because you spent some time, you should have been able to get that hit out of the way. But I felt that in the end we just needed someone fresh to have a go when he was struggling.

“These things happen in cricket and it was not nice to take him out, but I had to do that. That was a tactical decision at that point,” Jayawardene said in the post-match presser.

The decision couldn’t make any impact on the game as Mitchell Santner, who replaced Tilak Varma out there in the middle, faced just two deliveries and scored two runs off it.

MI needed 22 runs in the final over and Hardik Pandya picked a maximum off the first ball. However, Avesh Khan nailed his yorkers on the next five attempts to seal his team’s second win of the season.

Jayawardene acknowledged that his side conceded the match from a winning position and they could have been on the right side of the result with a little more intent.

“I think at the halfway point, even at the 14th-over mark, we were in it. With 12-14 balls out, we were at par with what they had scored as well. Yes, [LSG] had one big over at the end, but we had the game in control most of the time even after losing those two early wickets.

“It’s just disappointing that we couldn’t finish it. I think it’s early season, so we need to be more ruthless when we’re in those kinds of situations to try and finish a game off,” Jayawardene said.

Apart from Suryakumar’s fifty, MI skipper Hardik Pandya’s stunning bowling figures went in vain. Hardik became the first captain in IPL history to claim a five-wicket haul (5-36 in 4 overs), but it wasn’t enough to ensure a victory for his team.

“He’s got that adaptability and that’s why he’s one of the better all-rounders going around. With the experience that he has, he realized this is what he probably needed to do. We just needed to take a bit of the pace off, which we should have done in the PowerPlay as well.

“He definitely pulled the game back for us and gave us a pretty decent chance of chasing this total,” Jayawardene said.

Veteran opener Rohit Sharma was ruled out of the fixture due to a knee injury, and Jayawardene shared more details about the injury.

“Ro got a hit on his knee in the IT [Iliotibial] band, and he tried to bat yesterday. He couldn’t put any weight on it. So, again he came [on Friday] and did a fitness test to try. It was discomfort for him to bat, put weight on that. So that’s why we precautioned, we thought, [let’s] give him a few more days to try and get through that.”

It was MI’s third loss in five matches this season. They are currently languishing at the fifth position in the 10-team points table.

Mumbai Indians are scheduled play three of their next four matches at home and Jayawardene said his team’s troubles at away venues make those games must-win.

“I think the first two games, we did not have the rhythm. I think in Chennai and Ahmedabad, we got outplayed. But here, we were back to doing our best. I think our bowling needs a little bit of fine-tuning, and, obviously, batting needs to execute and finish a game. When you come on the road you are put out these challenges and that’s what good teams do.

“Now, yes, it’s probably written for us to make sure that we go out and play good cricket at home and win those matches. The tournament is still pretty open, I mean every team is beating each other. We have got some tough matches ahead of us against teams which are above us in the table, so that gives us an opportunity to try and take some points out of that,” he said.