Winless Mumbai Indians (MI) will take on the Delhi Capitals (DC) in the IPL 2023 on April 11 at the Arun Jaitley stadium in New Delhi. Mumbai will hope to finally grab a win this season and pile more misery on a beleaguered DC side.
MI lost their opening game against RCB in emphatic fashion as they posted a sub-par total of 171/7 in 20 overs while batting first. Tilak Varma played a key role with the bat for Mumbai, scoring 84 runs off just 46 deliveries. MI’s bowlers had very little success as Bangalore chased down the target with 22 deliveries remaining with eight wickets in hand. In their second game against CSK the batting faltered again. After being 61/1 at the end of the power play, MI were reduced to 76/5 and then 113/7 with four overs remaining. They stumbled to 157/8 but were well short of a competitive total and CSK won by 7 wickets with 11 balls to spare.
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The Rohit Sharma-led side have been by far second-best in both their games and will need to improve in all departments if they are to move up the table. The batsmen have not stepped up and have been removed cheaply, while the bowling attack has looked toothless and unable to make any notable inroads into an opposition batting line-up.
20 year old Tilak Varma is currently the top scorer for the team with 106 runs in 2 games.
After the CSK loss, MI skipper Rohit Sharma admitted that the seniors of the team, including himself, needed to step up and put up an improved batting show and also take the pressure off the youngsters after underwhelming performances in the opening IPL games of the season.
Cameron Green has scored only 17 runs in the two games. Much was expected from the INR 17.5 cr pickup and he will be expected to shine in the remaining 12 league games.
Surya Kumar Yadav has also scored only 16 runs from the two games. SKY has not looked like his usual destructive self and might need to go back to basics for a few games to get some runs under his belt and regain his confidence.
Jofra Archer missed the game against CSK due to a niggle and is doubtful for the upcoming game against DC. Riley Meredith was recently signed as a replacement for the injured Jhye Richardson and he might start in Archer’s absence alongside Jason Behrendorff. Arshad Khan has been very expensive in the opening games and might lose his spot in the playing eleven. Piyush Chawla, Hrithik Shokeen and Kumar Kartikeya have also been ineffective so far. The bowling unit has been able to scalp only 5 wickets from the two games.
MI will need to considerably improve their all-round game if they are to have a successful season again and will want their experienced players and expensive buys to stand out from the rest and make a difference in this tough time.
Arshad Khan, Kumar Kartikeya, Ramandeep Singh and Sandeep Warrier could be named as the Impact player options.
Here is MI’s predicted XI vs DC:
Openers: Rohit Sharma (c), Ishan Kishan (wk)
Middle Order: Suryakumar Yadav, Tilak Varma, Nehal Wadhera
All-Rounders: Tim David, Cameron Green, Hrithik Shokeen
Bowlers: Riley Meredith, Jason Behrendorff, Piyush Chawla
