Sky Analysis

IPL 2021: Match 17 – PBKS vs MI – Preview, Playing XI, Pitch Report & Updates

 

Punjab Kings have lost three consecutive matches thus they desperately need a win to get their campaign back on track. Mumbai Indians, on the other hand, themselves would be slightly concerned about their batting. They did manage to win two of their four games but none of the wins were convincing enough.

For Punjab, their batting struggled in the last season as well but because KL Rahul and Mayank Agarwal were in top form, they ended up posting decent scores. However, both of them have been inconsistent in this season. Chris Gayle too seems to have run out of gas while Pooran has three ducks in four matches of the IPL 2021. The bowling also seems to be too reliant on Mohammed Shami. Apart from him, they don’t seem to have a bowler who can be seen as a genuine wicket-taker.

For Mumbai, it was only the efforts of the bowlers that they have two wins to show in the table. However, they’ll know that their batsmen need to start contributing soon. On paper, we don’t see any issues in the MI set up but it’ll be getting a little frustrating for the MI fans to see their team failing to post big totals on the board despite having plenty of resources.

Pitch Report – The match will be played at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai. The surface is sluggish in nature and batting hasn’t been that easy. Going by the results, skipper that wins the toss would want to bat first.

Probable XI

KL Rahul (c&wk), Mayank Agarwal, Chris Gayle, Moises Henriques, Nicholas Pooran, Deepak Hooda, Shahrukh Khan, Fabian Allen, Murugan Ashwin, Mohammed Shami, Arshdeep Singh

Probable XI

Quinton de Kock (wk), Rohit Sharma (c), Suryakumar Yadav, Ishan Kishan, Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard, Krunal Pandya, Rahul Chahar, Jayant Yadav, Jasprit Bumrah, Trent Boult