Mumbai Indians skipper Sachin Tendulkar blamed his team's early exit from the Indian Premier League on poor batting.
It was Mumbai's bowlers who struggled at the Centurion to defend a decent total today, but Tendulkar conceded batting shortcomings were evident throughout the tournament.
Today the Indians recovered from a poor start to reach 165 for eight, but Virender Sehwag made 50 from 27 balls as the Daredevils overhauled the target in 17.3 overs.
The Indians had no chance of making the semi-finals and the defeat ended another unsuccessful campaign for the most expensive franchisee in the tournament.
"We have been consistently good with the ball in this tournament, so I can't blame the bowlers for this defeat," Tendulkar said.
"We have played reasonably good cricket in this tournament, it's just that our batting faltered at crucial stages.
"We started well defeating the Chennal Super Kings with an all-round performance, then we had a week off.
"It was almost a forced break as our match against the Rajasthan Royals was washed out.
"We seemed to have lost momentum after that. In most matches thereafter we fell narrowly short and it was just a matter of an extra 10 or 15 runs."
Tendulkar has been criticised for frequent changes in the batting order, but he defended his tactics.
"You cannot be predictable in this form of cricket," he said.
"Finishing matches was a problem and so we kept changing the combination and hoped for a good result.
"At times it worked for us, for instance when Dwayne Bravo was promoted to open against Kings XI Punjab and he was terrific.
"In the match against Rajasthan Royals, we needed six runs in nine balls with four wickets in hand and we lost.
"There is no explanation for those defeats."
Tendulkar said he was also hampered by injuries to key players, especially fast bowler Zaheer Khan.
"Zaheer's loss was a big blow," he said.
"After our first six games we lost three players - Zaheer, Shikhar Dhawan and Saurabh Tiwary - to injuries and it affected the balance of the team.
"They were key players in the starting line-up and we never really recovered from the loss of these players."
Sehwag's 50 was his highest in the tournament and he was pleased with his innings.
"I knew a good innings was around the corner," he said.
"We have given everybody opportunities to play in this IPL, they have all done well.
"Now we are looking forward to the semi-finals.
"I have returned to form, so it's good for my team."
The Daredevils meet either Royals Challengers Bangalore or Deccan Chargers in the semi-finals in Johannesburg tomorrow.
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