Following Mumbai Indians’ (MI) win against defending champions Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) on Tuesday, team owner Nita Ambani commended the franchise’s recruitment team for discovering remarkable talents such as bowlers Ashwini Kumar and Vignesh Puthur, alongside wicketkeeper-batsman Robin Minz.
During his remarkable debut, Ashwani took the first-ever four-wicket haul by an Indian player in an IPL opening match, inspiring Mumbai Indians to secure an eight-wicket victory against Kolkata Knight Riders at the Wankhede Stadium during their inaugural home game this season on Monday. Following contributions from Ashwani (4/24) and Deepak Chahar (2/19), who helped dismiss KKR for only 116 runs in 16.2 overs—with notable performances from Angkrish Raghuvanshi (26) and Ramandeep Singh (22)—Ryan Rickelton (62*, off 41 balls, hitting four boundaries and five sixes) along with Suryakumar Yadav (27*, scoring off nine balls with three fours and two sixers) ensured that MI achieved the target with 43 deliveries remaining.
After the match, Nita Ambani lauded the scouting team for their contributions. “I just want to congratulate everyone. This is what Mumbai Indians is known for. I think today I also want to take this opportunity to thank the scouts of the Mumbai Indians. They have worked very hard. Rahul (Sanghvi, Director of Cricket) is there in the corner. DJ (Dhananjai CKM, Chief Data Performance Manager) with all his stats and the entire scouting team. We have youngsters like Ashwani (Kumar), Vignesh (Puthur) in our team, Robin (Minz), so many of them, and I think we need to thank them also. So let’s give a big round of applause to all our scouts,” she said.