Not Hardik, Man Behind Retirement Move Explains Logic Behind Bizarre Call

Amid backlash over the move to retire out batter Tilak Varma, Mumbai Indians (MI) head coach Mahela Jayawardene revealed that it was he who made the bold call during an intense run chase. MI's impact substitute Tilak Varma made 25 off 23 balls before he retired out in the penultimate over. Jayawardene took full responsibility for subbing Tilak out, with the latter struggling to middle the ball despite spending plenty of time in the middle. Jayawardene explained he wanted someone "fresh" to have a go at the middle in the death overs

"Tilak batted well for us when we lost that (third) wicket and that partnership with Surya. He wanted to get going but just couldn't and waited till the last few overs hoping; because you spent some time, you should have been able to get that hit out of the way. But I felt that in the end, I just needed someone fresh to have a go when he was struggling. These things happen in cricket, and it was not nice to take him out, but I had to do that. That was a tactical decision at that point," Jayawardene said in the post-match press conference.

While pulling off a rescue act became too much for Hardik, considering his no-show with the bat, his record-shattering feat with the ball reverberated throughout the entire stadium. He got his hands on his first five-wicket haul in T20s and became the first captain to claim a five-for in the IPL.

"With the experience that he has, he realised that this [bowling slow and back of length] is what he probably needs to do because we did leak too many runs in the powerplay. We just needed to take a bit of pace off, which we should have done in the powerplay as well. I think that's why these guys are experienced; they adapt to conditions pretty well, see what the opportunities present, and he definitely, with the ball, he pulled the game back for us and gave us a pretty decent chance of chasing this total," Jayawardene added.

With figures of 5/36, Hardik's game-changing spell included the priceless scalps of Aiden Markram, Nicholas Pooran, Rishabh Pant and David Miller. He returned to the action to bowl the final over and removed the tail-ender Akash Deep to cap off his spell.

(With ANI Inputs)