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How Shreyas Iyer's Special Plan For Rajat Patidar Helped Mumbai Win 2nd SMAT Title

Abhinav Tyagi

Shreyas Iyer_Mumbai (Source:@Rajiv184/X.com)Shreyas Iyer_Mumbai (Source:@Rajiv184/X.com)

On Sunday, December 15, Mumbai beat Madhya Pradesh by five wickets to clinch their second Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy title. Skipper Shreyas Iyer was on cloud nine as he won his second T20 title in 2024 as a captain and fourth title overall. 

Before the start of SMAT 2024, MCA decided to go ahead with Shreyas Iyer to lead Mumbai instead of Ajinkya Rahane. The decision turned out to be a masterstroke as Mumbai lost just a solitary match in the whole tournament and were dominant throughout.

Talking about Iyer, his leadership skills were hailed by cricket pundits and fans. Further, his masterstroke in the finals also proved to be a key difference between the two teams. Iyer knew that MP skipper Rajat Patidar was the main man for MP and stopping him would do half the job for Mumbai. 

Iyer Introduce Spin From The Start

Thus, in order to prepare for Patidar, Iyer knew that the RCB star played spin well and bowled out all of his spinners Patidar came to bat. He did not want Patidar to play spin and kept his seamers reserved for the last ten overs. It is worth noting that Patidar faced no ball of spin in his 41 balls and all of them were from pacers. 

Player
Bowler
Runs Scored
Balls Faced
Strike-Rate
Rajat PatidarPace8141197.56
Rajat PatidarSpin000

The decision turned out to be a masterstroke as the spinners did their job in the first ten overs. The plan to bring spinners early on worked as they gave away just 36 runs in six overs and took a solitary wicket by Atharva Ankolekar. Only six overs of spin were bowled in the match by Mumbai and all were before the first ten overs. 

Patidar showed his class and scored an unbeaten 81 (40), which featured six fours and six sixes. Despite Patidar's brilliance, the move put pressure on other batters and did not let others score in the final, which put a lot of pressure on Patidar. Spinner Atharva Ankolekar opened the innings for Mumbai and soon Iyer brought Tanush Kotian into the attack. 

Had spinners came late into the attack, possibilities were that Patidar would have scored more runs and take the game completely away from Mumbai.