After a week-long rest, Kings XI Punjab come alive once again at the IPL 2018 as they take on Mumbai Indians at their adopted home, Holkar Stadium. The ground at Indore will now host all the home matches of Punjab and it will kickstart with MI. Mumbai Indians are languishing at the bottom of the point’s table and even a single loss kills the light hope that they have carried so far. This is the first match at the Holkar Stadium this season.
Here is how the probable XI of both the teams shape up –
Mumbai Indians
Even after half the season has passed by the defending champions Mumbai Indians find themselves at the last position in the points table. Of the eight matches that they have played in Mumbai has won only two and has lost six. They will desperately be seeking a win here.
In the last match they played against Royal Challengers Bangalore, Mumbai tripped them in the 18th and 19th over but conceded plenty in the last over to let go RCB. The chase fell flat as MI top order failed. It was upto Pandya brothers but the target proved too much.
Mumbai missed out on Evin Lewis in the last match due to his illness, Pollard and Duminy both played together. This match Pollard is likely to be dropped to accommodate Lewis once again.
Playing XI –
Jean-Paul Duminy, Rohit Sharma (c), Kieron Pollard/Evin Lewis, Mitchell McClenaghan, Suryakumar Yadav, Ben Cutting, Jasprit Bumrah, Hardik Pandya, Ishan Kishan (wk), Krunal Pandya, Mayank Markande
Kings XI Punjab
The team has surprised everyone this season and is already a firm favorite to win the trophy. They have steamrolled their opponents so far and have conceded only two losses in the seven matches that they have played so far.
Punjab played their last match way back in April. It was on 26th April against Sunrisers Hyderabad. With Ankit Rajpoot’s five-wicket haul and otherwise disciplined bowling, they kept SRH at only 132 runs. The chase however result of a spectacular collapse fell flat and they were all out for 119.
In the last match, KXIP decided to do away with Yuvraj Singh and included Manoj Tiwary who bowls with an extremely low round-arm action. Their only likely toss-up will be Axar Patel and Barinder Sran, depending on the pitch.
Playing XI –
Chris Gayle, Manoj Tiwary, Ravichandran Ashwin (c), Aaron Finch, Mayank Agarwal, Karun Nair, Lokesh Rahul (wk), Ankit Rajpoot, Barinder Sran, Andrew Tye, Mujeeb Ur Rahman
