The Mumbai Indians will take on the Kings XI Punjab in the 40th match of
the Indian premier league. The match will be played at the Wankhede stadium and will be a home game for the Mumbai Indians. Punjab who had a break
of 5 days, will play their second game in 3 days and because this will be away
from home, it will only get difficult for Kings xi Punjab.
Click for Live Score Card of Mumbai Indians Vs Mohali Punjab Kings
Till before yesterday, the Mumbai Indians were at the top of the points
table. However, they lost to the Rajasthan Royals and Kolkata beat Punjab in
the next match. This meant that Kolkata are at the top of the table and Mumbai
is at the second position. The loss to Rajasthan royals will hurt Mumbai badly.
For a team that has such a strong batting line up, to be bowled out for 95 was
abysmal. None of the top order batsmen got any runs and their performance was
below power to say the least.
What the Mumbai Indians need from this match is a concerted effort from their
top 3 and then a blast of towards the end of the innings. This will not only help
the Mumbai Indians to get to a big score, but also help regain their confidence
which would have taken a battering at the hands of Rajasthan royals.
Kieron Pollard's form will be a worry for the Mumbai Indians. He has not scored
too many runs in this tournament and the worst part is that he has not looked
like scoring as well. On the other hand, Sachin Tendulkar seems to have
lost his way in the last few games. The runs have dried up and that has put
pressure on the top order. Rohit Sharma will be a batsman to watch out for given
the way he performs under pressure.
Rohit's two innings before that game against Rajasthan were fine pieces of batting
and he would love to continue in the same vein.
Kings XI Punjab collapsed to 119 in their game against Kolkata. They looked
rusty after that 5 day break and that can be seen from the fact that there were
three runouts. Adam Gilchrist needs to take a little more responsibility with
the bat in his hand while David Hussey needs to bat at number 4. The
bowling attack revolves around Praveen Kumar and Ryan Harris. If the two can
extract bounce from the Wankhede wicket, Punjab will have a good chance of running
through the Mumbai top order. Still Mumbai will go into the match as favourites.
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