CHANNAI: The Mumbai Indians suffered a massive middle order collapse losing 6 wickets in the space of 5 overs to hand the Chennai Super Kings a 24 run victory which strengthens their chances of reaching the knock out stages.

Chasing a total of 166 the Indians got off to another good start with Sachin Tendulkar and Shikha Dhawan enjoying an opening partnership of 46 before Dhawan (16) was bowled by Thilan Thushara.

The Indians had reached 62-1 when Tendulkar, who was clearly struggerling with the heat retired at the start of the 9th over because of illness. The departure of the Indians skipper upset the balance of the team as they went into free fall.

Tendulkar departed with the Indians in complete control but his absence at the crease caused a massive middle order collapse which saw the Indians reduced to 89-7 losing 6 wickets in the space of 28 balls.

With his team in complete disarray Tendulkar returned to the crease in the 16th over to leave the Indians needing another 61 runs from just 21 balls.

Although Harbhajan Singh remained at the crease the task required to win the match was too great and the Indians lost only for the second time during this years tournament.

Having won the toss the Super Kings got off to a slow start losing Murali Vijay in the third over of their innings. Fresh from his century on Saturday against the Rajasthan Royals Vijay could only manage 14 runs before he was bowled by Harbhajan Singh leaving the home side 27-1.

Suresh Raina, the second leading run scorer in this years tournament contributed 23 runs before he was dismissed by Dwayne Bravo. Matthew Hayden was joined at the crease by MS Dhoni and the pair built a important third wicket partnership of 50.

The pair’s contribution rescued the Super Kings who had been finding it hard to score on a slow turning wicket as the Indians spinners dominated the early overs.

With a strong foundation behind them Hayden and Dhoni started to look to increase the run rate attacking Bravo and Adu Ahmed in the 9th and 10th overs.

With the run rate starting to increase the Indians struck back with the impressive Kieron Pollard picking up Hayden’s and Dhoni’s wickets in the space of two balls.

Dhoni (31) was the first to go after he attempted to sweep Pollard away to the boundary but could only manage to loop the ball into the air which allowed the bowler time to get under the ball to tacke a simple catch.

Hayden (35) followed a ball later after he was caught by Rajagopal Sathish out on the boundary to leave the Super Kings 119-4.

With two new batsman at the crease the Indians would have felt confident of keeping the Super Kings run rate down but Michael Hussey (14) and Subramanian Badrinath (30) played well under pressure building a partnership of 46 which allowed the home side to reach 165-4.