It’s play-off time
Chennai Super Kings players during a training session at the Kotla on Monday—Biplab Banerjee
After 72 matches and close to 50 days of non-stop action, the league stage of the nine-team IPL-6 slugfest has thrown up four contenders for the title, two of whom, Chennai Super Kings and Rajasthan Royals have tasted triumphs earlier.
And by virtue of finishing on top of the points table, CSK, and second-placed Mumbai Indians will get the first shot at booking a berth for the May 26 final when they face off in Qualifier 1 at the Kotla here on Tuesday.
The most consistent team in the tournament’s history, with titles in 2010 and 2011, CSK will enter the contest with an edge over Rohit Sharma-led Mumbai, who in the past five editions, have not been able to realise their potential by winning the league despite being one of the better balanced squads on paper.
The M.S. Dhoni-led Chennai team are a top pick to be one of the finalists at the Eden Gardens this coming Sunday because even if Mumbai do get past them on Tuesday, they will get one more chance in Eliminator 2, where they will clash against the winners of Eliminator 1 between the Royals and the Sunrisers Hyderabad.
And CSK losing two matches on the trot looks an unlikely scenario although the fickle nature of the format is known to have thrown up surprising results.
Mumbai will derive confidence from the fact that they have beaten CSK in both league matches this season. However, on the slow Kotla track strokeplay will not be smooth for batsmen from both sides.
Despite that, it is very likely that the likes of Dhoni, Suresh Raina and Michael Hussey for CSK and Sharma, Kieron Pollard and Dinesh Kathik for Mumbai will turn out to be the main protagonists on the night.
Sachin Tendulkar is likely to return to Mumbai’s XI after missing out the previous two games and given the fact that an IPL triumph is a rare missing feather from his cap, the 40-year-old, who has had a rather patchy season, will be pumped up to play an important role with the bat.
As far as bowling resources are concerned, MI will believe that with the likes of Mitchell Johnson and death specialist Lasith Malinga to ally with Harbhajan Singh and Pragyan Ojha, they have a decent chance to restrict the free-flowing CSK batsmen.
But Chennai have more than a competent unit themselves with Dwayne Bravo just missing out in the race the purple cap. Ravichandran Ashwin, Chris Morris and find of the season Mohit Sharma have all been effective for CSK.
And one cannot count out Super Kings’ all-rounder Ravindra Jadeja, who may give his skipper some more reason to pull jokes on him. All in all, it promises to be a cracker of a contest between the two that could likely go down to the wire.
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