IPL 2023 Eliminator Live Report - Lucknow Super Giants vs Mumbai Indians, Chennai

He hadn't played any IPL cricket before this season.

Now he walks away with the most economical five-for ever in the tournament's history.

Anil Kumble took 5 for 5 in 2009, but he bowled 3.1 overs.

Madhwal bowled two more balls than that.

Now LSG's best batter is off to the pavilion - to a run out!

A simple two to long-on results in the wicket when Stoinis runs into Hooda while taking the second.

That collision leaves him too far from his crease to make it in time.

It's followed by another run out three balls later

Lucknow Super Giants are 97 for 7 and pretty much done

Cam Green started it all.

Piyush Chawla made it better (he's having the best season of his life, at age 34)

And on the back of that wicket, Rohit went to one of his young guns. Akash Madhwal and he's broken this game open. These six balls have given Mumbai a 22% boost. They've jumped from being 70% favourites to 91% favourites.

Krunal Pandya the captain. Nicholas Pooran one of their best six-hitters. Both in the dug out.

Hrithik Shokeen was brought into the XI today because LSG don't score quickly against offspin.

Eeeeexcept Stoinis decided today's the day he'd change that.

Krunal did well, taking a single off the first ball.

The rest, even though Shokeen tried to hide the ball outside off, angling it from around the wicket, Stoinis reaches them all and drags them to square leg and midwicket

He's always been a spin hitter.

LSG's top-scorer sees his international team-mate and thinks he can boss him.

First ball, he looks to go big, probably straight down the ground, but the ball maybe doesn't come on particularly well.

He skews it off the open face to deep point, where Nehal Wadhera is. Had he taken off immediately, he might have reached it.

But he misjudges the catch, thinking it was coming straight to him. By the time he realised his mistake, and sprinted forward, putting in the full length dive, he lost too much time and he couldn't get under the ball.

Stoinis survives. He was 5 off 3. LSG were 28 for 2.

This is a better pitch than the one last night.

There's pace and bounce.

It's part of the reason why Mumbai were able to post a big total. It's part of the reason why LSG should've fancied themselves.

But again, this is Mumbai in a knockout game.

They are scary in a knockout game. They took a wicket in the same over where they missed a run-out opportunity.

And now they've taken out LSG's best bet to take advantage of the powerplay. Kyle Mayers gone for 14 off 12. He was brought in to hit hard when the field was up. He wasn't allowed to. MI are now 75% favourites to win this.

The angle from around the wicket into the left-hander worked to Wadhere's strength. He dragged everything into the leg side. Even sweeping balls well outisde off stump. Krunal was livid. He goes to the bowler and makes him change his angle. And the balls from over the wicket end up as dot and wicket.

ESPNcricinfo's win predictor says this total makes Mumbai 62.5% favourites.

Just like he did earlier in the tournament, also against Mumbai, when he defended 10 runs in the last over

What a time to show up.

Against the five time champions.

When they were 98 for 2 in 10 overs.

Naveen bowls a double-wicket over.

And now in the death, he takes out a man that Rohit Sharma thinks will become a huge star for Indian cricket.

Tilak Varma falls to another slower ball.

Earlier in the over, Nehal Wadhera had put him under a lot of pressure, sweeping balls from well outside off stump.

To prevent that, Naveen went wider and wider and was called for three wides in a row. Plenty of bowlers have buckled under this pressure and bowled at the batter's body, which is what they want.

Naveen doesn't. He keeps bowling wide. He takes the pace off. And he gets the wicket. Finishes with 4 for 38 - the ninth best figures in an IPL playoff match.

Mumabai have done what they might have anticipated they'd have to do.

They went in a batter light, with Nehal Wadhera only among the substitutes.

THe logic was if they needed the guy, they'd sub him in. Like they've done now, to face the 21 balls left in the innings. (SKY will sit out the rest of the game)

If they hadn't needed him, they might have brought in an extra spinner.

They had both options open. It's a fun way to use the Impact Sub. It's not formulaic.

Boucher meanwhile has been sighted talking to umpire Anil Chaudhary, potentially about the wicket of David off the non-no-ball full toss.

Tilak Varma who has spent a bit of time out with injury this season needed a bit of attention to his left thigh between the 16th and 17th overs.

We're into the death now. This is where Tim David is dangerous.

AND HE'S GONE! TO A FULL TOSS!

Nobody celebrated because everybody thought it was no-ball. They thought the full toss was too high. The umpires referred it themselves. And having seen the replays, the third umpire says "he's crouched" and gives it out.

David isn't pleased. Throws his arms up in exapsteration. Yash Thakur gets his second wicket. Both of them are big ones. Kishan in the powerplay, where he is most destructive. David in the death, where he is most destructive.

ESPNcricinfo's Shiva Jayaraman and Nagraj Gollapudi combine to produce this little nugget. There are people - me included - in our office who wonder if these two even sleep. And if they do, do they wake up going "Virat Kohli strike rate against spin!"

Sid Monga noticed it earlier in the game. They found Mohsin Khan last year. First IPL season, he finished among the top wicket-takers. The franchise valued him so much that they refused to replace him even though they knew he might miss a lot of matches in 2023.

Now Yash Thakur is showing how good he can be. He's tried not to bowl the same ball twice. When he goes full pace, he hits the pitch hard and is getting way more bounce than the batter is ready for. And when he takes pace off, he is getting balls to grip and hold in the deck. These are his overs tonight.

ESPNcricinfo's score predictor has a lot of respect for Mumbai's batting depth.

Two of their biggest guns fell in the space of three balls.

When Green and SKY were still at the crease, MI were forecast to score 195.

After they both fell, they were still forecast to score 190.

Tim David might be the reason why. He needed only 14 balls to make a bigger impact than a centurion in a game against Rajasthan Royals. Here he has almost half an innings.

A batter who thrives with pace on the ball - who can do magical things when there is pace on the ball - is dismissed by a slower ball. Naveen's legcutter at 107 kph.

Why did it take this long for LSG to try a slower ball? SKY gone for 33 off 20. Mumbai's batting gets a teeeeeeeeeeny bit weaker now.

They'll save Tim David for the death. They'll now turn to Tilak Varma. He hasn't batted for over 20 days in the IPL. He's been injured.

Cam Green is gone as well. He's another one who loves pace on the ball. And he's dismissed by one that had none on offer. 105 kph offcutter. He's through his shot too soon. Gets clean bowled.

Naveen celebrates putting his hands in his ears. Might be a response to the hate he's getting on social media for the fight with Kohli earlier in the tournament.

One good over spoiled by one bad over

Ravi Bishnoi shows why spin is a threat in Chennai. As soon as the field spreads, the slowness in the pitch prevents batters from doing what they like. Even their big shots end up in areas where there are patrols, turning fours into ones

Mohsin Khan comes on to follow that over and he goes full pace and too short. Both SKY and Cam Green launch him for MASSIVE sixes. Into the second tier. Giving a batter full pace and letting him get under it in Chennai is just bad bad planning.

Mumbai are 98 for 2 after 10 overs. Only twice has a team scored more in Chennai this season at this point of a game.

These were the conditions that were supposed to stop the biggest hitters this IPL. But they're not.

If they get through, Ahmedabad is a batting paradise.

Who will be able to stop Mumbai on a batting paradise?

MI have one in Cam Green.

CSK have one in Ajinkya Rahane.

KKR have one in Venkatesh Iyer

Three teams a pattern does not make, but it does appear to be something that might help. A failsafe against the early wicket.

Maybe T20 cricket is going in a direction where there is no need for a No. 3 batter. Just stack three openers up there. Use the third if an early wicket falls. If it doesn't, keep pushing him down the order, and keep pushing the big-hitters up.

Mumbai lost Rohit, Green comes in and hits his first ball for four. Now they've lost Kishan as well, but with Surya in the middle right now, there's no time to relax.

With spin backfiring, on comes the quick bowler, Naveen-ul-Haq and he takes out Rohit Sharma.

Mumbai's captain was looking to push the advantage. He might not have gambled on being 30 after three overs. But now that he is, he doesn't want to stop.

He charges at Naveen, he gets the room to free the arms, he lashes it aerial, but can't beat cover to his right.

Intent right, execution not quite.

The idea was sound. Take pace off against a team that loves pace on a pitch that lacks pace.

But bowling spin in the powerplay, when only two men can be on the boundary, is risky. LSG are finding that out the hard way.

This is Krunal in the first over

K Gowtham in the second over

Krunal in the third over

Each of those fours were the result of the batter beating the infield. Ishan beat point in the first over. He bisected point and short third - TWICE - in the second over. And Rohit beat short fine in the third over. Minimal effort. Almost maximum reward. 100% smart cricket.

That suggests they think the pitch will get harder to bat later on. They've been at their best chasing, and if they're shaking that up, there has to be a proper reason for it.

Rohit also confirms what Sid Monga suspected, Kumar Kartikeya sits out for Hrithik Shokeen, who bowls offspin, which has troubled LSG this season

Mumbai Indians: 1 Rohit Sharma (capt), 2 Ishan Kishan (wk), 3 Suryakumar Yadav, 4 Tim David, 5 Tilak Varma, 6 Cameron Green, 7 Chris Jordan, 8 Hrithik Shokeen, 9 Piyush Chawla, 10 Jason Behrendorff, 11 Akash Madhwal

Substitutes: Nehal Wadhera, Ramandeep Singh, Vishnu Vinod, Kumar Kartikeya, Sandeep Warrier

If Mumbai look like they're a batter light, it's because they intend to Impact Sub him in. They might call up Nehal Wadhera or Vishnu Vinod for a dismissed batter if he's really needed, if not, they can bring in a third spinner to defend whatever total they get.

Krunal Pandya says he would've liked to bat as well. But he's happy with the team he has, he says they can exploit these slow conditions. Sid Monga got another prediction right as well, he thought de Kock would go out for Mayers and he has.

Lucknow Super Giants: 1 Krunal Pandya (capt), 2 Prerak Mankad, 3 Marcus Stoinis, 4 Nicholas Pooran, 5 Ayush Badoni, 6 Deepak Hooda, 7 K Gowtham, 8 Naveen-ul-Haq, 9 Ravi Bishnoi, 10 Mohsin Khan, 11 Yash Thakur

Substitutes: Kyle Mayers, Daniel Sams, Yudhvir Singh, Swapnil Singh, Amit Mishra

Sanjay Manjrekar joins Vishal Dikshit and Kaustubh Kumar on ESPNcricinfo's Stump Mic podcast to review the final week of the tournament's league stage. The former cricketer also reveals his favourite moments from the commentary box this season.

Vishal has also taken care of our match preview, where he praises the influence of Krunal Pandya, stepping up to captain Lucknow Super Giants in the absence of KL Rahul, and the threat that their overseas batters pose.

Deivarayan Muthu reports from Chepauk:

Another humid evening in Chennai. A lot of empty seats in the stands because MS Dhoni is not in action today.

With CSK facing GT in the first qualifier yesterday at Chepauk, MI and LSG trained at the Guru Nanak college and the SSN college cricket grounds respectively on the eve of the Eliminator. Tilak Varma had given the Guru Nanak college women’s team a pep talk on the eve of the game. Varma is currently part of MI's training session at Chepauk and is likely to return to the XI - or the XII - as an Impact Player.

The Eliminator is set to be played on the pitch that had been used for the league fixture between CSK and MI on May 6. The ball didn’t turn that much then, but the slowness of the surface handcuffed MI’s batters. In that afternoon game, Deepak Chahar had bowled cutters and knuckle balls in the powerplay, with Dhoni up to the stumps. There was a bit of dew around when CSK and GT trained on Monday evening, but there was no dew during the game on Tuesday. Will dew be a factor today?

How will Suryakumar Yadav deal with a set of very good slow bowlers on a very tough slow pitch? LSG meanwhile haven't been great at facing offspin. Will Mumbai be thinking about bringing in Hrithik Shokeen to target that? Sidharth Monga with the Tactics Board for the Eliminator

How did Mumbai even get here when the pillars on whom their bowling stands on fell away less than halfway into the season? Shashank Kishore has the answers