As the most successful franchise in the history of the Indian Premier League (IPL), Mumbai Indians (MI) will be heading into the 15th edition of the IPL with a massive weight of expectations. The five-time champs have retained their crucial cogs of their core group of the past few seasons, but there are quite a few new faces this year who will play a crucial role in the franchise’s success. There’s a lot to analyze about what all strategies MI could conjure up leading up to the beginning of their new phase in the IPL.

Let us try and preview the MI squad and form the strongest possible playing XI . Rohit Sharma, Ishan Kishan, and Suryakumar Yadav conveniently pick themselves as the top-3 batters of this MI lineup. While, Rohit has a reputation for scoring big in the powerplay, Kishan will be serving as their first-choice wicket-keeper of this lineup. On ther other hand,  ‘SKY’ at number 3 will have to adjust his style of play according to the match situation.

Kieron Pollard is the only proven IPL commodity in MI’s lineup this season. He is a certain starter and should bat at number five or six, with newbies Tilak Verma and Tim David coming ahead of him. Tilak seems to be someone the MI management has invested a lot of faith in, which makes him the hot favorite to occupy the important two-down spot in the team.

Tim David, meanwhile, walks into the team at the back of ample experience in T20 leagues all around the world. With him and Pollard in the lineup, Mumbai should have 2-3 overs of quality part-time bowling available in every match.

While Mumbai Indians did manage to pick up Jofra Archer in the auction for a budget price of INR 8 Crores, it would be a year until the team actually manages to avail his bowling services. But even for the time being, they have some top-quality international names in their bowling unit.

Jasprit Bumrah obviously leads the bowling charge of the MI paltan, with the experienced Jaydev Unadkat as his partner in crime. MI would also want to replicate their template of going in with 2 quality overseas fast-bowlers, which makes Daniel Sams and Tymal Mills almost guaranteed starters for them. Sams, with his explosive batting capabilities, should bat at number 7- or maybe higher, depending on the match situation.

This leaves just one spot available in the team, and given the absence of any pedigreed spinner, leggie Mayank Markande should make it into the team’s first XI.

MI predicted strongest playing XI: Rohit Sharma (c), Ishan Kishan (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Tilak Verma, Tim David, Kieron Pollard, Daniel Sams, Jasprit Bumrah, Mayank Markande, Jaydev Unadkat, Tymal Mills.