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Mumbai: Their campaign stuttering due to continuous batting failures, Mumbai Indians would hope that Sachin Tendulkar comes back and inspires a turnaround when they take on a struggling Kings XI Punjab in the Indian Premier League match, here on Sunday.
The home team is hoping that Tendulkar, who has seen the action only from the sidelines after getting hit on his finger in the opening game on April 4, returns to the opening slot and gives the top order a much-needed dose of stability.
Mumbai Indians paid the price of reckless batting against Delhi Daredevils as they managed just 92 runs, their second-lowest total in five seasons, to lose their last match comprehensively.
The Mumbai batsmen have to get their act together against a visiting side that itself is placed at the bottom of the points table.
Tendulkar has started practising hard after missing the last four games and his presence, if it comes about, would certainly calm down the jangled nerves of the top order.
Key MI batsmen - Rohit Sharma, Kieron Pollard and Ambati Rayudu and Richard Levi -- have all been inconsistent while wicket-keeper Dinesh Karthik has been a total failure.
The additional worry for MI is that paceman Lasith Malinga is unlikely to take the field for the second match in succession because of pain in his back home.
Whenever MI were in trouble, the team had lobbed the ball to the Sri Lankan sling-arm bowler and he had delivered.
Munaf Patel has bowled extremely well and is, in fact, the highest wicket taker (10 in four games) for MI this season and he is expected to have Rudra Pratap Singh as back-up in pace for the second game running.
Though Punjab, whose batting has also not clicked in a big way so far, piled on their biggest score (163) of the season, they still ended up losing after getting a few early wickets through Parwinder Awana.
Captain Adam Gilchrist was absent due to hamstring injury and is set to miss Sunday's game too.
It was a big blow to Punjab's campaign as the former Australia keeper had just got among the runs when he made 40 against KKR, and in his absence David Hussey led the side.
Overall, the Punjab batting has not really lived up to the mark and the visitors would be eager to put behind the two back-to-back defeats at home.
Paul Valthaty, the Mumbai-born opener who was a sensation in IPL-4, has been the biggest flop of this season. As compared to the phenomenal 463 runs he had scored in the last season, he has mustered only 34 in six games.
Shaun Marsh, the Australian left hander, too has been in poor form as compared to last year when he amassed over 500 runs at 42.00 per innings. He has only 157 runs to his credit so far.
Also the fact that Punjab would be playing their third game in five days - and that too away - must be to their disadvantage even as MI have remained at home since April 10 and would have had a five-day rest before Sunday's game.
Teams from
Mumbai Indians: Harbhajan Singh (captain), Sachin Tendulkar, Abu Nechim, Amitize Singh, Aiden Blizzard, James Franklin, Kieron Pollard, Yohesh Chahal, Clint McKay, Herschelle Gibbs, Davy Jacobs (wk), Richard Levi, Dinesh Kartik (wk), Dhawal Kulkarni, Sushant Marathe, Pragyan Ojha, Munaf Patel, Robin Peterson, Sujit Nayak, Rohit Sharma, Suryakumar Yadav, Jaydev Shah, Rudra Pratap Singh, T Suman, Pawan Suyal, Aditya Tare, Apporva Wankhede.
Kings XI Punjab: David Hussey (captain), Abhishek Nayar, Nitin Saini (wk), Paul Valthaty, Bhargav Bhatt, Bipul Sharma, Harmeet Singh, Mandeep Singh, Gurkeerat Singh Mann, Amit Yadav, Paras Dogra, Parwinder Awana, Piyush Chawla, Praveen Kumar, R Satish, Ramesh Powar, Shalabh Srivastava, Sidharth Chitnis, Sunny Singh, Vikramjit Singh Malik, Azhar Mahmood, David Miller, Dmitri Mascarenhas, James Faulkner, Shaun Marsh.
Match facts
Sunday April 22, 2012 (day/night)
Start time 16:00 local (10:30 GMT)
