K Gowtham 'believed' in his miracle

The equation read 43 off 17 balls when an uncapped batsman walks in to play his fifth IPL innings. One of the best death bowlers in the world will take charge of the next over. His previous six balls produced two wickets and only one run. How do you think the game ends?

With the batting team winning, of course. K Gowtham smashed an unbeaten 33 off 11 balls, helped swindle 18 runs off Jasprit Bumrah's final set alongside the other match-winner Jofra Archer, and capped it all off with the six that won the game. But the shot that grabbed the most attention was a perfectly executed slice over the heads of point and short third man off the second ball of the 20th over. The composure he showed in that moment, to merely react to what was coming and not blindly slog because the game was going down the wire, was impressive.

When asked about that moment by the host broadcaster, Gowtham said: "I expected him to go for a yorker because the last ball he bowled was a bouncer. So I expected a wide yorker [and] as he had those fielders [at point and third man] in, I thought, let me wait for it and I just played the shot. That's about it.

"We do practice all this stuff. When you're batting No. 7 or 8, you're expected to get these kinds of deliveries and I've done this kind of practice much before the tournament and yesterday as well. So yes, I'd practiced and premeditated it would be a yorker. But it wasn't a yorker, it was a length ball, I might have gone straight."

Gowtham's 11-ball 33 was equivalent to 52 Smart runs - one of ESPNcricinfo's new metrics to make sense of T20 cricket. Essentially, his innings was worth 19 more runs when seen in the context of the scoring rate of the batsman at the other end and the overall scoring rate of the game. No other batsman had such a telling impact on the match. Suryakumar Yadav's 47-ball 72 came the closest. His effort at the top for Mumbai was worth 11 extra runs.

All of that was the result of the faith his team had in him. Previous experience of facing Bumrah also helped. "I have played him before in one of the tournaments which we play back home," Gowtham said. "We play Vijaya Bank tournament so I have played him at that time. But he was not Bumrah then. Now he is something different.

"All our support staff, my captain, my players, everyone just told me believe in yourself, believe in your ability. I had not done justice with the bat and I hope this is just the beginning."

The 29-year old allrounder from Karnataka, is actually rather well known for his big hitting. Prior to Sunday night's madness, he had a T20 strike-rate of 157, compiled over the course of 26 innings, and a career-best score of 60, in 29 balls, batting at No. 3.