Skipper Harbhajan Singh led from the front as Mumbai Indians came up trumps, comprehensively defeating Royal Challengers Bangalore by 31 runs in a low-scoring Champions League Twenty20 final in Chennai on Sunday.
It was great achievement for the Mumbai-based IPL franchise, who were without the services of regular skipper Sachin Tendulkar.
Batting first on a track that got lower and slower as the game progressed, Mumbai Indians put up 139. But that was challenging enough for Royal Challengers, who were shot out for 108 in 19.2 overs.
The moment last-man Raju Bhatkal was dismissed, it was celebration time, with Tendulkar and franchise owner Nita Ambani rushing in to congratulate the players.
The manner in which Tillekaratne Dilshan (27) started off, with a blazing cover drive off Lasith Malinga, it looked as if RCB would finish with a flourish.
But Mumbai Indians captain, Harbhajan Singh, then played a masterstroke that suddenly turned the tide. He gave Malinga an extra over, instead of the usual two he bowls in his first spell. Malinga yorked Dilshan with his first delivery, and the slide started from there.
Harbhajan (3/20), Malinga (2/23) and young leggie Yuzvendra Chahal (2/9) then kept things tight while picking wickets at regular intervals to seal the title.
The law of averages caught up with Chris Gayle (5), although he got a debatable leg before decision off Harbhajan when he plonked his frontfoot way forward.
A lot depended on Virat Kohli (11) but a cross-batted heave off Harbhajan brought about his downfall.
Almost all the RCB batsmen were guilty of misreading the nature of the pitch as they tried to hit everything out of sight and offered simple catches.
Earlier, Harbhajan opted to make the first use of a difficult track, where none of his top-order batsmen found stroke-making easy.
Daniel Vettori's left-arm spin and Bhatkal's seam-up stuff kept a tight leash on Mumbai's batsmen during the middle overs after a brilliant opening spell by Dirk Nannes.
It was Vettori's Black Caps' teammate James Franklin who hit a useful 41, which gave the Mumbai Indians' total a semblance of respectability.
What worked wonderfully for RCB was Nannes's opening spell. The tearaway quick bowler, who has been erratic most of the time, was spot on as he found the right length and also got some swing going in his favour. He had wonderful figures of one for 14 to show for his effort.
It was his scorching 148 kmph fuller delivery that saw Sarul Kanwar's (13) stumps uprooted after Aiden Blizzard (3) was run-out due to a horrible mix-up.
Ambati Rayudu (21) and Franklin added 41 runs for the third wicket in 5.1 overs -- sedate one by T20 standards, before the former holed out to Chris Gayle at extra-cover trying to hoick the military medium stuff dished out by Bhatkal.
Surya Kumar Yadav (24) looked fluent during his brief stay at the wicket as he hit Vettori for a six and four, but the RCB skipper showed smart reflexes as he ran out the youngster who had backed up too far.
Kieron Pollard, Rajagopal Sathish and Harbhajan Singh were all dismissed cheaply, which put paid to the hopes of posting a huge total.
Vettori (2/24) and Bhatkal (3/21) restricted Mumbai's total, not giving away easy runs in the middle and end overs.
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