You know you’ve pulled off a heist when you’ve managed to defend 12 off the final over of a T20. The heist becomes even more epic when it happens to be with Glenn Maxwell and Glenn Phillips at the crease. The epic becomes legendary when the context is that of a League Final. This is Rushil Ugarkar, the 22-year-old right-arm pacer. He’s uncapped in the international scene. But that’s not stopping him from wanting to bowl the tough overs. That’s not stopping him from stepping up and grabbing the role of MI New York’s designated death overs specialist in the 2025 season of the MLC. Hardened in the Mumbai Indians camp as a support player during IPL 2025, Ugarkar found the slingy wings of the master, Lasith Malinga, the team’s Bowling Coach, who was also MINY’s Bowling Coach in 2024. “I spent a lot of time with Malinga in the previous year as well. We worked a lot on my death bowling. Being in situations which are high pressure, doing those sessions paid off today,” he says in a chat with MINY after his incredible heist of nailing the 20th over to get MINY over the line in the MLC Final. “I noticed couple of things in his training routines. Every time he goes to a net session before a game, he kind of manifests how he’s going to bowl to each player and how he’s going to get them out. That’s something I wanted to add to my game as well. Before every game at the practice sessions, I would do that as well,” he added.Rushil had a pretty tough initiation to the MLC this year. He bowled the 19th over against the Washington Freedom in the league stage, defending 17 off 12, and was at the receiving end of Mark Chapman’s back-to-back boundaries that saw the match go past MINY’s reach. He impressed immediately in the following game against the Seattle Orcas, where he managed to keep Shimron Hetmyer quiet, conceding just three runs in the 17th over, and a miserly 29 runs in his four overs.It was the game against the Texas Super Kings where he faced his sternest test. Donovan Ferreira smashed him for a couple of sixes off the first two balls of the last over of the innings. Rushil, in trying to get defensive, went wide outside off, but in the process, went way past the tramline five balls in a row. To come back from that and produce a gem of a final over in the Final tells you about his character. You need some serious nerves of steel. “The entire squad has been really supportive,” Rushil said. “They have backed me all through. Even after getting hit, they kept me in the team and just kept giving me confidence and telling me ‘you got this, keep giving your 100% every ball’.”The redemption arc is complete. A star is unearthed. Rushil is here to stay. And conquer! 

It's a day to rejoice. We know you've been watching that last over on loop, you've smashed the replay button on Polly's acrobatic catch, just as we know you've been standing by us like a rock when the going got tough. ‘Peaking at the right time’, ‘It’s never about how you start but always about where you finish', ‘MI Spirit time', you've probably been hearing a lot of all this over the last few weeks. The tournament graph indeed was one of redemption, of rising from rock bottom. One more loss and we would've been out. But this where the peak MI character, ingrained in every player who dons the Blue and Gold around the world in all its different teams, rises. A character where we refuse to give up. A character where we always believe the trophy is ours. “Everyone stood together through highs and lows. Losing games is tough,” said Nicholas Pooran after the Final. "Every single person put their hands up…everyone had that belief and that is what I felt took us through. We believed there was a chance. That was the conversation, to just believe, stay together."After the action moved to Florida, the two back to back wins over LA Knight Riders injected some momentum into our campaign, helping us sneak into the playoffs. And Beast Mode arrived. “When you look at it, everyone that beat us twice in the tournament, when it mattered the most in the playoffs, we knocked them out. Sport is a wonderful thing. This moment may not come back again and we will never forget in our life. We are going to cherish it, embrace it,” he said. This is MI team. This is MI Fam. We are MI New York. 

2025 has been special. Five teams. Five playoffs. A champion in all three continents – Asia, Africa, America. Winning in the Mumbai Indians #OneFamily. We have added another star to our crest. Our Blue has some more Gold. It’s another epic day in our history with MI New York scripting history in the USA and winning their second MLC title. It’s a day to celebrate. In fact, it’s been a year on the whole to celebrate. MI Emirates were the first to make it to the playoffs. MI Cape Town went a step further in what was an absolutely dominant SA20 campaign to bag their first title. The Mumbai Indians Women then took the baton and marched towards their second championship win in the WPL. The men then fought a stellar campaign, coming back after losing four of their first five matches in the IPL to go on a seven-match winning run and break open the playoffs door. Although it ended in the second Qualifier, it was a campaign for us to be proud of. And finally, the boys in America have capped off the year on a high. They went a step further, peaking at just the right time, having won just one out of the first seven league games, to go on an unstoppable roll, bringing home our 13th piece of silverware in our rich history. 5 – IPL (2013, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2020) | Mumbai Indians2 – CLT20 (2011, 2013) | Mumbai Indians2 – WPL (2023, 2025) | Mumbai Indians2 – MLC (2023, 2025) | MI New York1 – ILT20 (2024) | MI Emirates1 – SA20 (2025) | MI Cape Town Fam, let’s pop the champagne!