IPL 2022: Mumbai Indians head coach Mahela Jayawardene made the comments after Mumbai Indians’ comprehensive 36-run loss to Lucknow Super Giants.
Left-handed batter Ishan Kishan was picked up by Mumbai Indians in the IPL mega auction for a whopping Rs 15.25 crore and the franchise was expecting him to be at his best and help the Rohit Sharma-led side get off to good starts. However, after scoring 81 in the first game this season, Kishan has failed to get going and he is currently going through a slump in form. In eight matches so far, he has managed 199 runs with an average of 28.43. After Mumbai Indians’ eighth straight loss this season, head coach Mahela Jayawardene said that Kishan has indeed struggled in the last few games and his performance is not what the team are “looking from him up at the top”.
“Obviously on the field you have seen that he struggled a bit in the last four games after having a good start in the first few. I have not had a conversation with him yet after this game to figure out what went through his mind on how we wanted to approach it. We have given him freedom to play his natural game which he probably has not executed well in the last few games,” said Jayawardene during a virtual post-match press conference.
“We have had conversations with him, even today when Rohit was batting well, he struggled. That is a conversation I have to have with him after this game. But, yeah, definitely not what we are looking from him up at the top,” he added.
In the match against Lucknow Super Giants, Kishan scored 8 runs off 20 balls and was not able to get going. He failed to rotate the strike and eventually was dismissed by Ravi Bishnoi in the eighth over of the innings.
Lucknow Super Giants defeated Mumbai Indians by 36 runs on Sunday to move to the fourth spot in the IPL points table.Listen to the latest songs, only on JioSaavn.com
Batting first, LSG posted 168/6 in 20 overs owing to skipper KL Rahul‘s unbeaten knock of 103 runs. With this innings, Rahul became the first player to score three 100s against one particular opponent in all T20 cricket.
Krunal Pandya then returned with three wickets as LSG restricted Mumbai to 132/8, registering a win by 36 runs.