Cricketer-turned-commentator Aakash Chopra believes that Mumbai Indians had a season which many franchise dream of. He heaped praise on the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 winners planning and execution by their players.
Mumbai Indians defended their IPL title only to become the second IPL franchise to do so. The 13th edition of the tournament was a more smooth journey for MI than in previous seasons. Without any hush-hush to qualify for playoffs, they moved forward in the tournament while displaying their best.
While talking on his YouTube Channel, Aakash Chopra also praised the performance of all departments of Mumbai Indians. He lauded the effort the five-time IPL winners put in an auction to find amazing talents. To sum up, he labelled them as the best T20 franchise in the world.
“The Mumbai Indians have an unbelievable depth, both in batting and bowling. They are amazing in the auction, which is also absolutely outstanding. In my opinion, they are the best T20 franchise team in the world.
Aakash Chopra stated that the good thing about Mumbai Indians is that they sort out their best XI before the beginning of the league while assigning roles perfectly as they had given to Ishan Kishan and Suryakumar Yadav.
“The good thing about the Mumbai Indians was that they knew from the very start what their best XI was and then they did not make too many changes after that. They gave good roles to Ishan Kishan and Suryakumar Yadav and both of them did very well in those roles as well.”
Mumbai Indians had enjoyed the best season any team could have had: Aakash Chopra
After starting the tournament with a defeat against Chennai Super Kings, Mumbai Indians demolished all the opposition to manifest their dominance in the league.
“Their season was good right from the beginning. They may have lost their first match to CSK but once they started winning, they almost hammered everyone. There was a significant difference between the Mumbai Indians and the rest of the teams,” Aakash Chopra added.
Aakash Chopra highlighted that with Quinton de Kock managing to set the base on fire, Ishan Kishan carried the momentum and accelerated the innings. He pointed that massive contribution from the above batting order gave less batting chance to Kieron Pollard and Hardik Pandya which speaks volumes about their batting combination.
“Quinton de Kock gave them an explosive start as an opener. When Rohit was there, he was good at the top of the order otherwise Ishan Kishan did a good job. They have great depth in their batting and we are not even saying this time that they gave less batting to Pollard and Hardik Pandya.”
Aakash Chopra signed off by observing that the Mumbai Indians enjoyed almost the best season any team could have had in an immensely competitive league like the IPL.
“This is the perfect season a team could ever have. It is impossible to have a season better than this in a league like the IPL. It might happen in the CPL where you win all the matches but that does not happen in the IPL,” he added.
Mumbai Indians was indeed the supreme this season. The extent of their domination can be ascertained by the fact that they almost thrashed the Delhi Capitals, the second-best team in the competition, in all the four encounters between the two sides.