Delhi: On Monday, in the 38th match of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024, Rajasthan Royals (RR) defeated Mumbai Indians (MI) by 9 wickets and remain on top of the points table with their 7th win. In this match played in Jaipur, Mumbai batted first and scored 179/9 runs. Nehal Vadera played innings of 49 runs and Tilak Verma played innings of 65 runs.

At the same time, for Rajasthan, fast bowler Sandeep Sharma took maximum 5 wickets. Chasing the target of 180 runs, star opener Yashasvi Jaiswal played a brilliant inning of 104* in 60 balls for Rajasthan with a century of 9 fours and 7 sixes, which included 9 fours and 7 sixes. Apart from them, with the help of veteran wicket-keeper batsman Jos Buttler's 35 runs and captain Sanju Samson's 38* runs, Rajasthan won in 18.4 overs.

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After the match, MI captain Hardik Pandya was asked what was the reason for the defeat at that stage. On this, Hardik said that we will learn from this defeat and win the next match and will keep smiling like always.

At the beginning of this IPL season, fans were talking about Hardik trying to keep himself calm like the great Mahendra Singh Dhoni, who has been smiling when facing defeat since the beginning of this year. In such a situation, former South African team's legendary fast bowler Dale Steyn has said that Hardik only verbally says let's move ahead. Apart from this, Steyn has criticized Hardik for not bringing changes in the Mumbai team.

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40-year-old Dale Steyn said, “I am really waiting for the day when players can honestly express their feelings. Instead we fool ourselves and our brains into saying the usual safe thing. We lose the next match, smile and then repeat that nonsense.”

Mumbai Indians have performed poorly under the captaincy of Hardik Pandya.

It is worth noting that overall, Mumbai suffered another bad defeat under the leadership of Hardik Pandya and they will have to win all their next matches to make it to the playoffs. However, the five-time champion has the ability to make a comeback.

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