Mumbai Indians will be looking for an ideal playing eleven to end their five-match losing streak when they take on Lucknow Super Giants in the IPL match at the Brabourne Stadium in Mumbai on Saturday.
While this is not the first time the former champions are experiencing a losing streak of five matches, this is probably the first time the team's think-tank does not have an idea of how to stem the rot that has set in.
It is certainly not skipper Rohit Sharma's fault that the five-time champions bungled big time at the auction table with below-par domestic signings, save NT Tilak Varma, which is coming to bite them.
Against Lucknow in the afternoon Mumbai heat, Rohit and his chosen ten will have to put their best foot forward in order to tame the likes of Quinton de Kock, K L Rahul, Krunal Pandya and Ayush Badoni, to name a few.
Krunal and De Kock, in particular, would like to pose a serious challenge to the Mumbai Indians brigade and compel them to think whether not putting enough effort to get them back in their roster was a prudent enough thing to do.
Certainly, there were some inexplicable team selections and dropping a million-dollar-plus buy like Tim David after two games is one of them.
Such has been Mumbai Indians’ plight that they haven't been able to field their full quota of foreign players in order to have enough bowlers in their ranks.
However, David may be given a go in place of a Jaydev Unadkat, who has once again come short in the highest level of cricket, an example of the yawning gap between standards in domestic cricket and the IPL.
One among Unadkat and Basil Thampi need to make way for David as they don't have too many options on the plate.
In the case of Murugan Ashwin, the only plausible replacement at this time looks to be leg-spinner Mayank Markande, who not so many moons back had some decent performances for the five-time champion outfit.
Not having a quality spinner, like Rahul Chahar or Krunal, who can at times stem the flow of runs, is also hurting Mumbai.
Head coach Mahela Jayawardene had already said and, rightly so, that Rohit's performance isn't a worrying factor.
One of the reasons being his touch, which is not out of place. Perhaps he needs to curtail a few shots and bat deep along with Ishan Kishan and Suryakumar Yadav to put up a challenging score which the weak bowling line-up can defend.
For Lucknow, mentor Gautam Gambhir needs to think whether both Marcus Stoinis and Jason Holder could be a part of same eleven or they would be better off dropping one of them and playing the hard-hitting Evin Lewis in the top-order alongside Rahul and De kock.
Teams
Lucknow Super Giants: KL Rahul (captain), Manan Vohra, Evin Lewis, Manish Pandey, Quinton De Kock, Ravi Bishnoi, Dushmantha Chameera, Shahbaz Nadeem, Mohsin Khan, Mayank Yadav, Ankit Rajpoot, Avesh Khan, Andrew Tye, Marcus Stoinis, Kyle Mayers, Karan Sharma, Krishnappa Gowtham, Ayush Badoni, Deepak Hooda, Krunal Pandya, Jason Holder.
Mumbai Indians: Rohit Sharma (Captain), Anmolpreet Singh, Rahul Buddhi, Ramandeep Singh, SuryakumarYadav, Tilak Verma, Tim David, Arjun Tendulkar, Basil Thampi, Hrithik Shokeen, Jasprit Bumrah, Jaydev Unadkat, Jofra Archer, Mayank Markande, Murugan Ashwin, Riley Meredith, Tymal Mills, Arshad Khan, Daniel Sams, Dewald Brevis, Fabian Allen, Kieron Pollard, Sanjay Yadav, Aryan Juyal and Ishan Kishan.
