Mumbai Indians became the last team to book their place in the IPL playoffs and they had to do it the hard way. After chasing down another 200 run total against Sunrisers Hyderabad on Sunday, they waited, anxiously, for Royal Challengers Bangalore to help them out. By the end of the night, an already-qualified Gujarat Titans came to their rescue and MI had a forward journey to Chennai to look towards.
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The five-time IPL champions won three of their last four games to squeeze through but now that’s in the past, they can focus on what’s to come. However, they will not be given a chance to salvage themselves in the knockout stage of the competition. A loss tonight, against Lucknow Super Giants, and they’re going out.
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In their inaugural season, LSG made the playoffs but were sent packing by RCB. They would hope to do better this time around. Fact that LSG are here, without any drama, is commendable considering they lost skipper KL Rahul and seamer Jaydev Unadkat in the business end of the league stage.
Stand-in captain Krunal Pandya has been clever in his leadership and boosted his side’s confidence which is evident in their close wins over MI and KKR (by 5 runs and 1 run).
Unlike Mumbai Indians who have been prolific more with the bat than the ball, Lucknow Super Giants don’t have a high scoring player this season. Marcus Stoinis, with 368 runs, is 19th in the list of top scorers in IPL 2023. Kyle Mayers (361 runs) and Nicholas Pooran (358 runs) are in the same region. LSG have been forced to rely on their foreign recruits with just two Indians, other than KL Rahul, scoring fifties (Ayush Badoni and Prerak Mankad).
With injuries to key players, MI have chopped and changed and unearthed talent in the process. Nehal Wadhera and Akash Madhwal have been two such players.
MI and LSG cannot be more uneven with Mumbai the best chasing side this season and Lucknow the best defenders of totals. On a slow pitch at Chepauk, runs will come at a premium which opens the path for a close contest. If records mean anything, LSG have a 3-0 head-to-head over MI.
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