The 13th season of Indian Premier League is set to commence in Abu Dhabi tonight and in the opening match defending champions Mumbai Indians will take on their biggest rival Chennai Super Kings.
Mumbai Indians who have won each of their last 5 IPL matches against Super Kings will look to extend their winning streak. Mumbai Indians have covered almost all bases but they don't have an experienced spinner and in that case, Rahul Chahar and Krunal Pandya will have to lead from the front. In the batting, they have good depth and the likes of Rohit Sharma, De Kock, Hardik Pandya, Ishan Kishan, Surya Kumar Yadav and Pollard make for a very good batting line up.
In the pace department they will miss Lasith Malinga and in his absence Jasprit Bumrah will have to do a lot of work. Although he will have Trent Boult, Nathan Coulter Nile and Mitchell McClenaghan for the support.
On the other hand, Chennai Super Kings will be eyeing to end their five match's losing streak against Mumbai Indians. In the batting department they are without Suresh Raina for this season and in his absence captain MS Dhoni, Shane Watson, Faf du Plessis and Ambati Rayudu will have to do the job and in bowling they will miss Harbhajan Singh but the likes of Imran Tahir, Piyush Chawla, Ravindra Jadeja or Mitchell Santner are good enough to do the job.
In the pace department they have Deepak Chahar, Dwayne Bravo, Lungi Ngidi, Josh Hazlewood, Sam Curran and Shardul Thakur who is a good attack for these conditions.
All the major stats and facts ahead of the first match between Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings in Chennai :
Head to Head :
T20 Matches - 28
Mumbai Indians won - 17
Chennai Super Kings won - 11
5 - Mumbai Indians have won each of their last five matches against Chennai Super Kings in the IPL.
5 - Jasprit Bumrah has taken only 5 wickets at an average of 43.40 in 8 matches against Chennai Super Kings in the IPL.
28 - Dwayne Bravo has taken 28 wickets at an average of 19.25 in 19 matches against Mumbai Indians in the IPL - the most by any bowler.
47 - Shane Watson needs 47 more runs to complete 1000 IPL runs for Chennai Super Kings. He will become the eighth batsman to achieve this milestone.
150 - Dwayne Bravo needs 3 more wickets to become the fifth bowler to take 150 or more wickets in Indian Premier League.
300 - MS Dhoni needs to hit 5 more sixes to complete 300 sixes in T20 cricket.
1000 - Suryakumar Yadav needs 64 more runs to become the seventh player to score 1000 or more runs for Mumbai Indians in the IPL.
2012 - Mumbai Indians haven't won their opening match of an IPL season since 2012. Their last win in opening match of an IPL season came against Chennai Super Kings at Chennai in 2012.
