Guptill, the anchor man

Before Sunday night, Mumbai Indians had only two double-digit opening partnerships in IPL 2016 and neither lasted beyond the Powerplay. Rohit Sharma has been a near-constant presence at the top but he has had three different partners so far. His longest association was with Parthiv Patel - their nine innings together yielded a meagre 129 runs - while he opened once each with Lendl Simmons, who was subsequently injured, and Unmukt Chand. Mumbai needed stability at the top, especially in the aftermath of two miserable batting performances. They needed Martin Guptill.

Guptill has had an interesting IPL. He was ignored at the auction despite being explosive during New Zealand's home summer. Even as franchise officials were trying to rationalise the likes of Guptill going unsold, Simmons' injury brought him to Mumbai within a week of the tournament having begun.

Guptill's debut, in Hyderabad, was the only time Rohit didn't open this season. He made 2 off 4 balls and didn't get another game for almost a month, but that didn't affect his morale. During a practice session in Visakhapatnam, Guptill, golden beard and all, revelled in the role of a pantomime villain in a mock wrestling bout with an uncapped Indian player. It seemed like Guptill was content to be behind the scenes. With the tournament at its business end, however, Rohit & co. sought him out for a more hands-on role.

On Sunday, Delhi Daredevils, who have been quite savvy this season, wanted to exploit a slow pitch from the start and gave the first over to left-arm spinner Shahbaz Nadeem. Rohit seemed nervous as the ball stopped and turned, but a mental switch to attack took care of that. The Mumbai captain had found his rhythm with a slog sweep and a lofted cover drive so Guptill was happy playing second fiddle.

Besides, he was still finding his bearings. Zaheer Khan spotted, and exploited, it with a bouncer that pinged Guptill on the helmet in the fifth over. The batsman was clearly shaken, and a ball later, he was beaten again. But Guptill persevered. He even went on the offensive after Rohit was dismissed in the seventh over, with the score on 46, to deflect pressure off the new batsman Krunal Pandya.

An inside-out drive through cover and a cut past point against the legspin of Mishra and Imran Tahir took Guptill to 23 off 21 balls. By then Krunal had assumed charge and was going for broke on the leg side. He found 58 of his 86 runs between midwicket and long-on, and acknowledged that Guptill's guidance was important to his unfettered stroke-play.

"When I went in at No. 3 the message was clear - I had to go [after] the spinners," Krunal said. "There were two legspinners and one left-arm spinner. So, in between Martin helped me a lot. We discussed that, 'you stay back, play through the innings and I will take the charge' because both legspinners and left-arm spinner was there. So it was easy for me. The kind of wicket was you need one batsman to play till 15-16 overs so you can lay the foundation for the other players."

Guptill was aware Krunal was in overdrive and ensured he got most of the strike. From 61 for 1 in eight overs, Mumbai found 36 more in the next four overs, with Guptill consuming only three dot balls out of the 10 he faced. And when Tahir switched ends in the 13th over, he decided to supplement Krunal's efforts with a few hits of his own. Guptill took Tahir by surprise, picking his googly early and slog sweeping it for six. Next ball, Tahir went for the conventional legbreak but Guptill saw it coming and, having given himself a little room, carted it over extra cover.

With powerful strikers like Jos Buttler and Kieron Pollard to come, Guptill tried to step up the run-rate and by the time he was dismissed in the 15th over, Mumbai had reached 144 for 2. Forty-eight off 42 balls may not be a jaw-dropping tally, but in Guptill Mumbai had found an assured opener to take the load off Rohit. While it might be a belated discovery, with only one game to go, it may yet be opportune for Mumbai in what is shaping to be a tight battle for the top-four spots.