Mumbai Indians (MI) captain Rohit Sharma failed to impress with the bat once again during their match against Punjab Kings (PBKS) on May 3 in IPL 2023.
Rohit got out for a three-ball duck, disappointing his team who needed a flying start while chasing 215 to win at PCA Stadium in Mohali. This was his third consecutive low score in the tournament after making two runs against Gujarat Titans (GT) and three against Rajasthan Royals (RR). By getting out for a duck, Rohit also joined the list of batters who have been dismissed on ducks for the most number of times in the IPL, along with KKR’s Sunil Narine, Mandeep Singh and RCB’s Dinesh Karthik. This was his 15th duck in IPL history, and he became a part of a list he would rather forget on his 200th match for MI.
But things turned a little ugly when the official Twitter handle of PBKS mocked Rohit by sharing a tweet which read, “R0 (digit 0 instead of O)”.
This tweet didn’t go well with Rohit’s fans, and they slammed PBKS for taking a dig at the MI skipper, who is also nicknamed RO.
MI’s official Twitter handle responded quickly to PBKS’s tweet mocking Rohit’s duck, reminding them of his six IPL trophies (5 as MI captain and 1 as a player of now-defunct Deccan Chargers). In contrast, PBKS (previously known as Kings XI Punjab) have never won an IPL title despite being part of the tournament since the inception of the tournament. Following this reminder, PBKS deleted their earlier tweet.
Rohit Sharma 🏆 x 6️⃣
KXIP 🏆 x 0️⃣
PBKS 🏆 x 0️⃣#Respect— Mumbai Indians (@mipaltan) May 3, 2023
Despite Rohit’s poor outing with the bat, his team successfully chased the 215-run target with six wickets in hand. MI won the match by six wickets and registered their fifth victory in nine matches of IPL 2023.
Ishan Kishan and Suryakumar Yadav contributed with their quick-fire half-centuries, stitching a 116-run partnership for the third wicket. Suryakumar’s fifty was his third in the last four matches of the ongoing season. Tim David and Tilak Varma also added valuable runs in MI’s win and took their team to the finish line with seven balls to spare.
