A blockbuster Sunday awaits ahead for the cricket fans as the proceedings of today’s IPL matches is headed by another known and intense rivalry in Mumbai Indians and Kolkata Knight Riders at the iconic Eden Gardens. The Eden Gardens is home to the Knights but also home to the opposition captain as this venue holds great and fond memories and also for the cricket fans as many iconic cricketing moments have happened at this venue. Let us head to the preview of today’s game.
Overview:
Mumbai Indians: 5-time champions of the tournament are lacking intent since their last championship win in IPL 2020. Clueless to say, in simpler words. There comes testing times to successful people, wherein their real strength is tested and the result spinning out of it shows who they really are. Mumbai Indians are in that phase wherein they were dished and dashed in their first two matches, only to come back to winning ways when they met Delhi Capitals in their last match and opened their account in the points table. Suryakumar Yadav, a star from the franchise and an enigma of the upcoming start in T20 cricket, is having the worst season he could ever dream of and the franchise would be most eagerly awaiting to see him come back in form and take the franchise home in his usual style, A franchise which struggled to qualify for playoffs in the initial years of the tournament, then turning the tables to be a dominant and a side to be feared to come to the position of holding the wooden spoon, Mumbai have come a long way in 16 editions of the IPL. As they have tasted a little of success in the current edition, they would like to maintain the momentum and take things forward to ensure they don’t end up like 2022 edition.
Kolkata Knight Riders: The Knights from the City of Joy were in news when they did the unimaginable last week with their underdog Rinku Singh snatching away the game from the defending champions Gujarat Titans. But one should taste their own medicine when they are down which was shown by Sunrisers Hyderabad’s Harry Brook and Mayank Markande to the Knights respectively with the bat and the ball. The Knights would like to put away the result on the back of their shoulders and would like to step ahead and think of moving towards the next game. Andre Russell’s return to form with the ball will be a positive sign for the Knights as he has been abysmal with the bat and is giving more depression to the fans that what their own life gives to them. Sunil Narine, another star of the team, is also not upto his mark and one would expect the twin dangers to send shivers down the spine of the opponents. Batting of the Knights has been tad decent and you can expect some changes today with either of Litton Das or Jason Roy coming in for Rahmanullah Gurbaz as he has been returning with poor scores.
Injury and replacements:
- Jofra Archer has been nursing an injury and may miss out the games going forward and there are rumours spreading that he may go back to England to be fit for the Ashes which, if true, would be a blow to the franchise.
Probable XIII (including impact players):
Mumbai Indians: Rohit Sharma (C), Ishan Kishan (WK), Cameron Green, Tilak Varma, Suryakumar Yadav, Tristan Stubbs, Tim David, Hrithik Shokeen, Riley Meredith, Piyush Chawla, Arshad Khan (Impact Players: Dewald Brevis/Jason Behrendoff, Ramandeep Singh, Shams Mulani, Nehal Wadhera, Arjun Tendulkar).
Kolkata Knight Riders: N Jagadeesan (WK), Litton Das / Jason Roy, Nitish Rana (C), Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Shardul Thakur, Umesh Yadav, Varun Chakravarthy, Lockie Ferguson / Tim Southee, Suyash Sharma(Impact Players: Venkatesh Iyer, David Wiese, Vaibhav Arora, Khulwant Khejroliya, Harshit Rana).
Interesting Facts:
- Head to Head: Mumbai Indians and Kolkata Knight Riders have met for 31 times with Mumbai leading 22 to 9 against Kolkata.
- Rohit Sharma leads the batting charts between both the sides with 904 runs.
- Rohit Sharma is 34 runs away from becoming the fourth player to complete 6000 runs in IPL after Virat Kohli, Shikhar Dhawan and David Warner.
- Rohit Sharma is also 5 maximums away from 250 sixes in IPL.
- Ishan Kishan is 57 runs short of completing 2000 runs in IPL. The wicketkeeper-batter is also 89 runs away from 4000 runs in T20 Cricket (Overall).
- Varun Chakravarthy is 2 scalps away from completing 50 wickets in IPL.
- A unique feature of the game is it will witness a full house although no tickets were sold. The home franchise has given free entry to about 19,000 kids from 36 NGOs.
(Credits: Cricbuzz, Mykhel.com and my dear cricket fanatic friends)
Pitch / Weather Report:
It will be the first afternoon game this season at the Wankhede, and the pitch might behave differently than in the first game here. Both batters and bowlers will likely get equal help from the pitch. The average first innings score here in the last five games has been over 160 runs, but this might be a low-scoring thriller. (Credits: https://www.crictracker.com/)
Venue: Wankhede Stadium, Mumbai
Date & Time: April 16th at 3:30 PM IST and local time
Live Streaming: Star Sports Network and Jio Cinema
Dream 11 Team:
