Mumbai Indians beat Rajasthan Royals, strengthen playoff hopes

Mumbai Indians have made their chances of reaching the IPL playoffs stronger by winning their seventh match of the season—and their sixth in a row.

On Thursday, they defeated Rajasthan Royals by 100 runs. With this win, Mumbai climbed to the top of the points table, while Rajasthan are now out of the playoff race with three matches still left to play.

Mumbai had set a big target of 218 runs. Chasing it, Rajasthan were all out for just 117 runs in 16.1 overs. Jofra Archer scored the highest for Rajasthan with 30 runs, while captain Riyan Parag added 16 runs.

For Mumbai, Trent Boult and Karn Sharma took 3 wickets each. Jasprit Bumrah took 2 wickets, and Deepak Chahar and Hardik Pandya took 1 wicket each.

Earlier, Mumbai were invited to bat first after losing the toss. They scored a strong total of 217 runs in 20 overs, losing just 2 wickets. Openers Rohit Sharma and Ryan Rickelton both scored half-centuries—Rohit made 53, and Rickelton scored 61. Together, they added 116 runs for the first wicket.

After their dismissal, captain Hardik Pandya and Suryakumar Yadav remained unbeaten, adding 94 runs together. Both scored 48 not out.

For Rajasthan, Maheesh Theekshana and Riyan Parag took one wicket each.

With this win, Mumbai now have 14 points from 11 matches and sit at the top of the table. Rajasthan, on the other hand, have only 6 points from 11 matches.

Rajasthan is now the second team to be knocked out of the playoff race. On Wednesday, Chennai became the first team to be eliminated.