Former Indian cricketer Sanjay Manjrekar believes the Mumbai Indians should abandon their left-right hitting combo for the moment being in order to stage a comeback in the IPL 2021. The Rohit Sharma-led squad lost their 3rd game in a row in the UAE leg of the T20 competition on Sunday, dropping them to 7th place in the standings.

The five-time winners were defeated by the Royal Challengers Bangalore by 54 runs on 26th September at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium. According to Manjrekar, opponents usually have strategies in their hands to counteract a left-right combo. The Challengers deployed Glenn Maxwell, who took 2 wickets, while Yuzvendra Chahal resorting to inaccurate ‘urns to lefties.

Harshal Patel’s hat-trick afterwards blasted them away. According to Manjrekar, the Mumbai-based franchise has suffered greatly because of the inconsistency of Suryakumar Yadav, Hardik Pandya, Ishan Kishan, and Krunal Pandya. He also advocated for the elevation of Kieron Pollard to the top of the batting order.

I would request MI to send batters as per their self-confidence: Sanjay Manjrekar

“It’s a pretty unique scenario where they’ve got their three main players- Suryakumar Yadav, Ishan Kishan, Hardik Pandya and to an extent Krunal Pandya- looking really off-colour. So, they might want to dump the left-hand right-hand combination,” Manjrekar told.

“What happened today is because there was always a left-hander in that middle stage as a part of their left-right combo tactic, allowed Maxwell to bowl four overs. The left-hander was there because there was a leg-spinner operating, waiting to make his life difficult,” he stated.

“But Chahal bowled a googly to get Kishan out. So, the leggie has another delivery that will make it tough for the lefty. I would request MI to send batters as per their self-confidence at the moment. No point in sending Krunal, who’s feeling the pressure. Maybe someone like Pollard could come up and MI can abandon the left-right combo at least for a couple of games,” Manjrekar added.

MI are set to face Punjab Kings, headed by KL Rahul, on Tuesday, 28th September at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi in an attempt to make a comeback in the current IPL.