Pune Warriors:
After having served the four-match sabbatical imposed on him, Manish Pandey announced himself in the field on Monday by pinching a corking catch on the boundary, judging his footing on the ledge to a nicety. His batting could not get going on Monday, but the IPL’s first Indian centurion is the kind of player who makes waves and can be played anywhere in the order too. Yuvraj Singh has displayed the occasional vestige of his World Cup form – during a 66 against the Delhi Daredevils and the other during an unbeaten finish against Kings XI Punjab – but on Monday, he was beset by the slowness of the Chepauk wicket. Except in Pune's first match, in which a 60-run second-wicket partnership took out Pune to their maiden win, Mithun Manhas has not raised a peep so far. He may be played higher up the order so as to optimise his productivity.
The Warriors' attack, comprised of nippy pace, will find comfort back home at the DY Patil Stadium. If their win against Kings XI on this pitch was manufactured by a heady display of wicket-taking by Alfonso Thomas and Srikant Wagh, Wayne Parnell ran through the Kochi Tuskers top order. To round off Pune's consistent issue of pace, Jerome Taylor picked up 3 wickets in his first game in for the Warriors.
Yuvraj, too, tossed in a Man of the Match performance with a 4-for against the Daredevils, though it was in a losing cause. Leggie Rahul Sharma has picked up only four wickets so far, but with an sub-6 economy rate, his strength lies in tying batsmen down. Murali Kartik has been utterly wicketless in the three matches he has played; Wagh’s pace may be more effective on the Mumbai wicket. The Warriors may sullenly wish for their international-capped players to be fit soon, as players such as Graeme Smith and Ashish Nehra are not much good outside of the playing XI.
Chennai Super Kings:
Michael Hussey now has a 41 and two 60-plus scores from the four outings he has had this season. The wonder of his batsmanship is in how he is able to justify his pseudonym of ‘Mr. Cricket’ in a format where barbarians and bohemians find their calling. On Monday, the slowness of the wicket mattered not to the 36-year-old Aussie; he maintained a cool boundary strike rate even though his other two southpaw colleagues, Suresh Raina and Albie Morkel, were innocuous. Put this man on Jupiterean terrain and he could get you a fifty, with some diving stops thrown in for good measure!
Many may have made their peace with the fact that MS Dhoni is no longer the same rambunctious pulveriser he had been in ancient times, but a little worrying, nonetheless, is the fact that he has gone a while without scoring a substantial one. Murali Vijay needs to get some jet packs attached to his shoes, because these days, his feet seemed to be mired in slush; he narrowly escaped being run out on as many as three occasions on Monday. His shots, however, seem as fluid as ever, and his strike rate of 145 is among the highest in this season. If Yuvraj Singh gets another catch coming in his direction from Vijay’s bat, he may do well to pouch it. For, pending are dangers such as Suresh Raina and Albie Morkel; and these two are due a score after having failed on Monday.
Morkel and Raina, however, manage to chip in one way or the other. The Warriors will remember how Raina led the pack with inspired stops in the ring and Morkel broke the spine of the chase with crucial wickets; having peppered the batsmen’s cranial area with considerable frequency, the couple of deliveries that Morkel bowled on length were good enough to breach the batsmen’s defence. Doug Bollinger, alongside, was the strangler in action, and his 2/20 killed any chance the lower order had of making a thrust towards the finish line. Ravichandran Ashwin’s spell of 2/19 was even more decisive and penetrative. Tim Southee will count himself unlucky if he misses out on being selected for the pace-friendly Navi Mumbai track. Suraj Randiv may have to sit this one out.
Likely teams:
Pune Warriors: Mohnish Mishra, Jesse Ryder, Manish Pandey, Robin Uthappa, Yuvraj Singh, Mithun Manhas, Nathan McCullum, Rahul Sharma, Jerome Taylor, Murali Karthik, Alfonso Thomas.
Chennai Super Kings: Michael Hussey, Murali Vijay, Suresh Raina, MS Dhoni, Albie Morkel, Subramaniam Badrinath, Aniruddha Srikkanth, Ravichandran Ashwin, Shadab Jakati, Doug Bollinger, Suraj Randiv/Tim Southee.
Watch out for…
… Robin Uthappa. Although he has been inconsistent, he has often languidly dispatched the quick bowlers to the ends of the boundary. He will know that he has been felled by spinners all season long and be on his guard against Ashwin, Shadab Jakati and Suraj Randiv.
Michael·Hussey may have walked away with the MoM award on Monday, but the unsung hero in yellow was Ravichandran Ashwin. His 2 wickets were the calculated results of conniving variation, and his economy of 4.75 indicates he was aggressive with impunity. The pace of Ashwin's gentle spin may not be, by definition, ideally suited to the Mumbai track, but he finds ways to exploit every kind of wicket.
Prediction: Chennai will need to get the momentum going now that they have a played a practice-match (so to speak) against Pune Warriors. The Warriors cannot afford for this game to go the wrong way, as a fourth consecutive loss will make for loss of points as well as create backward momentum. The last instance of two teams playing back to back matches was between Kolkata Knight Riders and Rajasthan Royals. To observe a parallel, the Knight Riders had ridden to a comfortable win at home – much like Chennai Super Kings did on Monday – , and then looted the Royals in Jaipur. And Chennai Super Kings certainly are strong enough to pull off that kind of a heist!
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