Mumbai, March 28 A strong Mumbai Indians team will begin their bid to end a five-year title drought in the Indian Premier League when they take on a weakened Kolkata Knight Riders in their tournament opener here on Sunday.
It has been a while since Mumbai Indians, the joint most successful team in the IPL, won a trophy, which they claimed five times between 2013-2020.
Last year, the Hardik Pandya-led side finished third after losing to the runners-up, Punjab Kings, in the Qualifier 2, but Mumbai Indians feel they are well-prepared to try for what would be a record-extending sixth title win this year.
A revamped Rohit Sharma will be eager to return to form, while Mumbai Indians' all-round strength makes them a formidable team once again. This includes a significant portion of India's T20 World Cup winning squad, including captain Suryakumar Yadav, Pandya, Tilak Varma, and Jasprit Bumrah.
MI's strong overseas talent pool includes Ryan Rickelton, Sherfane Rutherford, Corbin Bosch, New Zealand captain Mitchell Santner, Will Jacks, AM Ghazanfar, and even Trent Boult, who is expected to partner with Bumrah.
Mumbai Indians also have seasoned Indian players in Shardul Thakur and Deepak Chahar, while Naman Dhir could once again play the role of a finisher, which he successfully executed last year.
Therefore, the challenge will not only be to find the right playing combination and utilize the Impact Player rule, but also to secure early wins, which will give them momentum. Mumbai Indians, known for being slow starters in the IPL, need to avoid this.
The visiting Kolkata Knight Riders, led by captain Ajinkya Rahane and young Angkrish Raghuvanshi, will be in Mumbai, but they still have several questions to answer before the match begins.
The biggest challenge for the KKR leadership group will be to find a bowling attack that is significantly different from what they had planned after the auction.
Mustafizur Rahman was released by the franchise on the instructions of the BCCI, while two of KKR's India bowlers, Akash Deep and Harshit Rana, are out of the tournament due to injuries.
Blessing Muzarabani, who has earned a good reputation in white-ball cricket, may play a key role from the start, but the success of the bowling line-up will largely depend on Varun Chakravarthy.
KKR also have two former CSK players, Rachin Ravindra, who should strengthen their batting, and Matheesha Pathirana. Tim Seifert is the only choice for wicketkeeper-batter, while they also have two quality all-rounders in Cameron Green and Sunil Narine.
Teams:
Mumbai Indians: Hardik Pandya (c), Quinton de Kock (wk), Danish Malewar, Robin Minz (wk), Ryan Rickelton (wk), Sherfane Rutherford, Rohit Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav, Atharva Ankolekar, Raj Bawa, Corbin Bosch, Will Jacks, Mayank Rawat, Naman Dhir, Mitchell Santner, Shardul Thakur, Tilak Varma, Ashwani Kumar, Trent Boult, Jasprit Bumrah, Deepak Chahar, AM Ghazanfar, Mayank Markande, Mohammad Izhar, Raghu Sharma.
Kolkata Knight Riders: Ajinkya Rahane (c), Rinku Singh (vc), Finn Allen, Tejasvi Dahiya (wk), Manish Pandey, Rovman Powell, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Ramandeep Singh, Sarthak Ranjan, Tim Seifert (wk), Rahul Tripathi, Daksh Kamra, Cameron Green, Sunil Narine, Rachin Ravindra, Anukul Roy, Vaibhav Arora, Saurabh Dubey, Kartik Tyagi, Blessing Muzarabani, Matheesha Pathirana, Navdeep Saini, Prashant Solanki, Umran Malik, Varun Chakravarthy.
Match starts at 7:30 PM IST.
