In Case You Missed It: Reviews, retirements, and the race to the IPL final

This time next week a new IPL champion will already have been crowned, though who it will be is still anyone's guess. The Mumbai Indians have already booked a berth in the final, but who - the Royal Challengers, the Delhi Capitals or the Sunrisers Hyderabad - will meet them there? Delhi have already had their hat handed to them twice by Mumbai this season and the third result, in the first qualifier, was no different. A team that managed to flip the script for their third outing though was Zimbabwe, who beat Pakistan in a tense Super Over to clinch the final ODI - and they will be hoping to carry that momentum into the T20I series to follow. Catch up on all the excitement of the week that's been.

Trent Boult, Jasprit Bumrah, Ishan Kishan and Hardik Pandya lead rampant Mumbai Indians into final
A blockbuster finish by Kishan and Pandya, and clinical strikes by MI's two fast bowlers took apart the Delhi Capitals, who will now have another go in the second Qualifier.

Blessing Muzarabani the hero, twice, as Zimbabwe win final ODI in Super Over shootout
After taking a five-for in the regulation overs, Muzarabani took two wickets in the Super Over to give his team a three-run chase, which they pulled off. Pakistan, however, won the series 2-1.

Shane Watson retires from all cricket
Watson closed the chapter on a nearly 20-year career during which he was one of the world's premier white-ball allrounders. Though he'd retired from international cricket in 2016, he became a powerhouse player in T20 leagues around the world, taking two IPL teams - the Rajasthan Royals and the Chennai Super Kings - to the title in 2008 and 2018. Also calling it a day was Marlon Samuels, the West Indies 2012 and 2016 WT20 champion, who had informed Cricket West Indies about it in June.

Sri Lankan government gives LPL green light; likely to start on November 27
After much uncertainty - which Andrew Fidel Fernando tells the SLC absolutely not to worry about in this month's Briefing - the LPL finally looks set to go ahead and to be played entirely in Sooriyawewa Stadium in Hambantota. Players will have to complete a seven-day quarantine and the new start date may allow PSL players to also play the LPL.

Virat Kohli: Life in a bubble is tough, we need to rethink length of tours
As India players prepare for a long tour of Australia, the Indian captain weighed in on bubble-to-bubble cricket, saying life in the strict biosecure environment "does get difficult at times because it is repetitive". Sam Curran too expects some players to opt out of national selection "in the near future", as the strain of life in a series of bubbles begins to take its toll.

IPL team reviews
With the final next week and the laggards already out of the competition, the ESPNcricinfo staff took stock of where the now-eliminated franchises went wrong. Sruthi Ravindranath picks apart bottom-of-the-table Rajasthan Royals' batting-order failures, while Deivarayan Muthu calls for an immediate revamp of the ageing Chennai Super Kings squad, who failed to make the playoffs for the first time in their history. The Kolkata Knight Riders were hobbled by the non-performance of their biggest players, Suni Narine and Andre Russell, says Sresth Shah, while the Kings XI Punjab, who had made a promising start, also met their undoing in the failures of their top performers like Glenn Maxwell and an inability to finish games, says Saurabh Somani.

Trailblazer Salma Khatun 'feels lucky' to play in the 2020 Women's T20 Challenge
Mohammad Isam speaks to the Bangladesh allrounder who's playing in her first overseas T20 league.

Why Rishabh Pant needs to understand his own game better
He hasn't excelled in the IPL this year, and now finds himself out of favour in the India set-up. He still has his talent but his mindset might need some work, says Aakash Chopra.

Seven ways to improve T20, starring high-res cameras, shared meals, and more
Cricket's newest format is still evolving, though not fast enough, says Jarrod Kimber. He knows just how that might be fixed.

The balls of the century, No. 3: Muttiah Muralitharan to S Ramesh
Andrew Fidel Fernando on one memorable delivery in Colombo: there is drift, there is turn, and the bowler is nearly as surprised as the batsman.

First sportsperson I wanted to be: Angelo Mathews: 'All these years later, Vaas is still the benchmark'
Chaminda Vaas was Mathews' hero at school. He has been one ever since.