Pune aim to reprise winning start against Mumbai
Match facts
Mumbai Indians v Rising Pune Supergiant
Monday, April 24, 2017
Start time 2000 IST (1430 GMT)
Form guide
This season: Steven Smith and Imran Tahir played leading roles in securing Rising Pune's seven-wicket win against Mumbai in their season opener.
Overall: Rising Pune have a 2-1 win record against Mumbai including their match this season.
In the news
An unwell Lasith Malinga missed the match against Delhi Daredevils. His replacement Mitchell Johnson stepped up well for Mumbai in his first appearance this season, bowling tightly to complement Mitchell McClenaghan's onslaught in the Powerplay. Malinga trained with the team on the eve of the match and is likely to be available for selection. Johnson's slot may hence be the only one open to change in an otherwise settled Mumbai line-up. The pitch looked dry on Sunday could assist the fast bowlers again on Monday. It is understood Mumbai were bothered by the pace in the track against Daredevils and spoke to the groundsman about it on Sunday.
For Rising Pune, Faf du Plessis batted extensively in the nets a day before the match but it's hard to find an overseas player he could replace easily.
Likely XIs
Mumbai Indians: 1 Jos Buttler, 2 Parthiv Patel (wk), 3 Nitish Rana, 4 Rohit Sharma (capt), 5 Kieron Pollard, 6 Krunal Pandya, 7 Hardik Pandya, 8 Harbhajan Singh, 9 Mitchell Johnson/Lasith Malinga, 10 Mitchell McClenaghan, 11 Jasprit Bumrah
Rising Pune Supergiant: 1 Ajinkya Rahane, 2 Rahul Tripathi, 3 Steven Smith (capt), 4 MS Dhoni (wk), 5 Ben Stokes, 6 Manoj Tiwary, 7 Dan Christian, 8 Washington Sundar/Rahul Chahar, 9 Shardul Thakur, 10 Jaydev Unadkat/Ankit Sharma, 11 Imran Tahir
Strategy punt
How should Pune keep Mumbai's most prolific batsman this season quiet? By bowling length deliveries to Nitish Rana outside off. So far in the tournament, he has scored 102 runs off 96 such deliveries. He has shown deftness at handling the short ball, however: smashing six sixes in a tally of 50 runs from 17 deliveries.
Stats
- The second-most successful opening pair in this IPL, Jos Buttler and Parthiv Patel, has added 263 runs at an average of 37.57 and has opened in all the side's games so far. The continuity is in stark contrast to the previous season when Mumbai used five opening pairs that tallied 225 runs. In the current season, Mumbai and Sunrisers Hyderabad are the only two franchises to have used the same opening combination in all games so far.
- Pune would look to bring in spin early to counter Mumbai's openers. Buttler, for instance, has a scoring rate of 10 per over against pace in the Powerplay (165 runs off 107 balls) but has faced only eight deliveries from spinners in that phase in the IPL. Parthiv has a scoring rate of 9.47 (110 runs off 76 balls) against the quicks, which drops to 6 per over against spinners (15 off 18 balls) in the Powerplay. In their opening match, Parthiv, Buttler and Rohit fell to Imran Tahir for a total of 60 runs.
- Rohit Sharma's overall record against legspin in the IPL: 449 runs off 404 balls with 17 dismissals. That accounts for over 15% of his dismissals overall in the IPL. In terms of batsmen dismissed most number of times by legspinners, only Suresh Raina ranks ahead of Rohit with 18 dismissals.
- Steven Smith's favoured opposition in the IPL has been Mumbai. Overall, in seven matches against them from 2012 to 2017, he has scored 272 runs at an average of 68 and a strike rate of 144.68. Of the current Mumbai attack, he has lost his wicket only to McClenaghan and Jasprit Bumrah - once each.
- Mumbai are on the verge of their best winning streak in the IPL, having currently won six consecutive games. The last time they won six straight games was in the inaugural edition in 2008.