When Dwayne Smith and Brendon McCullum hit their stride, every over is like a highlight reel isn't it, with fours and sixes coming quicker than advertisements in IPL 2015.
Smith and McCullum were at their destructive best against the Mumbai Indians, taking the Chennai Super Kings to another extremely easy victory.
Chasing a score of 184, McCullum and Smith put on 109 runs together in just a tad over seven overs – nope, not kidding – to knock the living daylights out of the MI bowlers and leaving the rest of the CSK batsmen with the easiest of jobs of scoring the rest of the runs.
It was as authoritative and dominating a performance as they come from the Super Kings again, who have now won three games out of three in IPL 2015.
"It was a good wicket, and we have been quite opened to different plans," said CSK skipper MS Dhoni during the post-match presentation. "We were happy to bat second, because we were worried about the dew and with a fresh wicket I was confident the pitch would remain the same. I think 180 was par, maybe 190 was par, and I felt the bowlers did well, especially early in the match in the first six overs."
The man who got those early wickets for CSK was Ashish Nehra, who was deservedly given the man of the match award, and he was obviously a happy camper. "I'm working hard, T20 is the kind of format when you're bowling well, you sometimes don't get wickets, and they don't recognise your performances," said Nehra.
"But, I'm bowling well, and thankfully I'm getting the wickets. I feel it is the bowlers who win you matches, and if you bowl well up front, you set the tone."
The same cannot be said of course for the Mumbai Indians, who, yet again, flattered to deceive with their top order collapsing with the bat again, while their bowlers had absolutely no answers to the smash-bang antics of McCullum and Smith.
"There is no way we should have conceded 90 runs in the first six overs," said MI captain Rohit Sharma after the match. "Yet again our bowlers failed to execute the plans, and we paid the price for it. That six-over opening spell probably lost us the match.
"We need to go back and try and understand why this keeps happening."
Get the Match Highlights of Mumbai Indians vs Chennai Super Kings HERE and HERE
