At the end of four hours and ten minutes, barring the match officials considering the horrifying over-rate, there were plenty of smiles in both camps. Mumbai Indians registered their opening win in IPL 2020, and their first in the United Arab Emirates, while Kolkata Knight Riders were probably happy the ordeal was over. In the last four years, Knight Riders have won just one game against Rohit Sharma’s men and have lost nine. From their point of view, it’s good that they have one match out of the way against a bogey team early on in the tournament.

By the end of it all, Dinesh Karthik stressed he doesn’t want to be too critical of While Knight Riders pacers struggled for height, Mumbai pacers managed to comfortably hit the shoulder height and at pacethe 49-run defeat against Mumbai and rightly so. It was a strange evening for Knight Riders. Promising at first and frightful from thereon. When Shivam Mavi struck in the second over, to remove Quinton de Kock, it seemed they had sorted out their powerplay nightmares. Last season, lack of wickets in the first six overs was a concern as they got just 16 wickets in 14 games in the powerplay.

One of the objectives set by Mahela Jayawardene for the Mumbai batting unit was to hit the 180-run mark. Rohit was going to be crucial with the batting depth compromised a bit and after an early wicket. As Rohit battled nerves, the Knight Riders bowlers forgot the very basics of bowling to the Mumbai captain. In every bowler’s meeting, the presentation on Rohit contains a point in bold to avoid bowling short. Instead, Sandeep Warrier served one to the Mumbai captain in the very first over. The short and wide delivery was hit for a six wide of third man. Rohit’s next six came only in the fifth over. He had moved to 13 off 13 when he stood tall and whacked a short delivery over the mid-wicket fence. Later in that over, Pat Cummins erred on length once again and was pulled for another six.

Rohit struck six sixes on the night – five of them coming against short or back of length deliveries and none climbing to the shoulder. “I back myself to play that (pull) shot,” Rohit said after the game. “I am very confident playing that shot and have practised quite a bit. I am glad that it came out well today and I am happy with the performance.

“It was all nerves to start with because we haven’t played much cricket and six months is a long time. I was quite keen to make it count today. It was pretty tough because the heat takes a lot out of the body. Towards the end, I just wanted to stay still and hit. We’ve seen it in the few games that one set batsman batting till the end and taking the game away from the opposition and that’s all I was trying to do.”

Cummins, Andre Russell and Kuldeep struggling for execution was pretty understandable though. Russell had bowled just 13 overs in the Caribbean Premier League on low-slow tracks while Cummins was allowed to come out of quarantine only at 4 pm on match day. While it wasn’t lack of match time, it was more a case of taking longer to acclimatise to different conditions.

The difference between the two sides was the execution of their short balls. While Knight Riders pacers struggled for height, Mumbai pacers managed to comfortably hit the shoulder height and at pace. Jasprit Bumrah, Trent Boult, James Pattinson and Kieron Pollard bowled just 16 deliveries that were fuller in length in the 15 overs they combined to bowl. Once Boult realised there wasn’t any swing on offer in the first over, the plan changed to keeping the length short. Sunil Narine was rattled early by Pattinson and eventually fell to the pacer trying to pull. Shubman Gill too was caught at midwicket trying to force a short ball from Boult. Knight Riders played out 21 dot balls in the first six overs – scoring 33 for 2 – and eventually lost the plot.

“I think we had areas to do well in bat and ball. I think it was a pretty rusty day, to be honest. The boys realise where they could have done better,” Karthik said after the game. “Don’t want to be too analytical. It’s very unfair to judge Cummins right now. He’s just off quarantine. At 3.30-4:00 he got the permission to come and play the match. This is not the game where we need to judge him at all. He’s a world champion bowler. He’s one of the best going around and I trust him completely. I am sure he’ll come good.”

It wasn’t all doom and gloom though for Knight Riders. If Mavi’s early wicket came as a positive, the way the bowlers managed to pull things back will also please the think-tank. Mumbai looked set to cruise past 200 and had to eventually settle for 195 for 5 with Mavi bagging two wickets and Russell finishing well against Pollard. “Upfront Mavi was really good. The poor guy missed out last year because of an injury and he’s really looking forward to the tournament this year. He’s shaping up well and that’s a good sign for the team,” Karthik said about his young pacer.

While Knight Riders don’t have a lot of time ahead of their next game against Sunrisers Hyderabad on Saturday, things will only improve after the rusty outing. What will worry the side though is the negative net run rate of -2.450 and finding ways to correct it.