Losing against Pune have given us the wake-up calls: Mahela Jayawardene

Mumbai Indians losing to the Rising Pune Supergiant three times in the ongoing season in as many games this season is the much-talked point ahead of the final of Indian Premier League’s 10th edition. However, MI head coach Mahela Jayawardene thinks that their losses over RPS have done better to the team and has served them as the wake-up calls every time.

“First we wanted to make sure we removed the monkey out of our heads of slow starters,” said Mahela about getting rid of the slow-starters tag from the team. “Our first game was against Pune, they gave us a wake-up call that we have to play better cricket. After that, we got some momentum, won some close matches and made sure we kept going and again we got a wake-up call vs Pune again (laughs) which made us regroup and made sure we didn’t slatter towards the end of the season.

“It was a good team effort and a lot of guys have put their hands in tough situations. And again, they (Pune) helped us to regroup again and put on a good effort in Bangalore and made us realise our mistakes,” he talked about the positives from those losses.

Ahead of the final, both the captains and coaches addressed the media at the ITC Kakatiya in Hyderabad after which the captains posed along with the IPL trophy.

Team effort

Mumbai didn’t have their key players coming to the party on many occasions but the young ones turned up to fill the space. Speaking about their form Sharma said, “It’s been a team effort. I am not really concerned about key players not performing. Not everyone could have a good day at the same time but whenever players had an opportunity, they stood up and performed taking the responsibility and ensured the team crosses the line. We certainly not had any individual brilliance throughout the tournament.”

Rohit is currently one of the two players with three IPL titles so far, out of which 2 of them have come for MI with him leading the side. Another title this time will make him the most successful player to play the IPL and the most successful captain as well. However, he feels that he has more to look forward to right now as the captain.

“Personally, I will have a 3rd chance to get that title as a captain but that is not the thing I am looking at as a captain. I have to focus on my job of making sure all the players are playing the cricket which he is expected to play and perform like how we performed throughout the season,” said Rohit.