Jean-Paul Duminy celebrates with Amit Mishra, in Mumbai, on Saturday

Calcutta: It was only 10-runs that stood between Mumbai Indians and victory, as the Sachin Tendulkar-led side once again faltered. This time they failed to successfully chase 136 against the Deccan Chargers, on Saturday.

Some disciplined bowling from the Chargers saw them push the Mumbai Indians off the track. The hosts could just manage 125 for eight in their stipulated 20 overs. For the Chargers, Anand Rajan claimed three, wickets while Ishant Sharma picked up two scalps.

The following are excerpts

Kumar Sangakara: I thought a score of above 150 would have been good on this wicket… But we were fooled in the first six overs where we could not find a footing. However, the last over of our innings was the turning point of the match when Mishy (Amit Mishra) got under Munaf’s skin a bit.

We can still influence the table, we need to try and win every game we play. Today (Saturday), we showed a lot of character and a lot of passion while defending a small total. It was a great team effort. We bowled brilliantly in the first six overs. I brought on JP (Duminy) early in the innings because it seemed to be a good ploy to try and work out the leftie (Andy Blizzard).

Sachin Tendulkar: The loss was disheartening… I thought we controlled the game till the 19th over (of the Deccan Chargers innings), but we conceded too many runs in the last over.

I expected the wicket to be better… The ball was gripping a bit, which made stroke play difficult. We could not really up the ante when needed… There were also too many dot balls… And on top of that we kept losing wickets. Although Keiron Pollard and Harbhajan Singh played little cameos towards the end, (I thought) it was a slow but certain death.

The teams which were not doing well earlier have picked up, while the teams that were performing have slumped. We need to go through this obstacle and stay tighter.

Amit Mishra: I’m trying to work a lot on my batting. It (his exchange with Munaf in the last over of Deccan’s innings) happens in the heat of the moment…