MATCH: Royal Challengers Bangalore v Mumbai Indians
DATE: Sunday, October 9, 2011
TIME: 2000 hours IST (1430 hours GMT)
VENUE: M Chidambaram in Chennai
Royal Challengers Bangalore will play Mumbai Indians for a chance to lift the Champions League T20 this year.
Past Record:
Royal Challengers Bangalore’s campaign this tournament has been a two-part story. In the first part, they have batted first, got the 170s but conceded wins when both, the Warriors and Kolkata have chased it down.
Then, in the second part, they have had the likes of Chris Gayle, T Dilshan and Virat Kohli carting the opposition bowling away to all parts of the ground on a flat to get themselves to three successive scores of more than 200 to win the game. Somerset and the two Australian sides, South Australia Redbacks and New South Wales Blues have been at the receiving end of the carnage and have lost each time.
The Mumbai Indians have been surprise finalists to say the least. They started off with a shock win over the Chennai Super Kings and then almost messed up a game that they should have won against Trinidad and Tobago. A rained-off match against Cobras was followed by a loss to the New South Wales Blues and yet, the other results in their group allowed them to go through to the semi-final.
In the semis, the Mumbai Indians batted well for a change, on a sluggish Chennai track and got to a challenging 160. Then, Lasith Malinga bagged four wickets to stall a matured knock from Craig Kieswetter to get to the final.
Side-effect:
Neither side has won the Champions League T20 before, so a win here will give them the trophy. Interestingly, the Royal Challengers Bangalore are the only side in the history of the CLT20 to have qualified for the tournament every season and would consider themselves deserving winners!
Team News:
Royal Challengers Bangalore will not want to fiddle around too much with their batting, which has already seen three successive scores of more than 200 in the tournament. Chris Gayle has starred in two, Tillakaratne Dilshan has got a 70 in one while Virat Kohli was the man of the match in a couple of those games as well.
Where they will want to change things around is their bowling. Syed Mohammad was injured in the previous game and they replaced him with a batsman, Mohammad Kaif. However, Bangalore has struggled with the bowling because of the lack of incision and might be looking to get in either Abhimanyu Mithun or Syed Mohammad into the side.
The Mumbai Indians had gone into the semi-finals with four foreign players after the Champions League governing council had revoked the allowance that had been provided to them earlier. This means that they should go into the game with the same 11 that beat Somerset in the final.
The advantage that the Mumbai Indians could derive from their inexperienced set is that the opposition may not have seen them too much. Sarul Kanwar can hit the long ball, Suryakumar Yadav had only recently made a 190 in under-21 cricket and Aiden Blizzard smashed a half-century in the semi-final – all of whom will have a role to play in the final.
Who is hot?
Mumbai Indians will need their captain Harbhajan Singh to bowl better than he has bowled in the tournament so far while Lasith Malinga will be the danger-man as far as the opponent is concerned. The Royal Challengers Bangalore will look at their top three to give them a good start, but Saurabh Tiwary will know that he needs to score some runs as well if he gets an opportunity.
Prediction:
On paper, Bangalore is head and shoulders above the Mumbai Indians. However, the Mumbai Indians have stuck well together and on a slower track, could make it difficult for Bangalore. Bangalore to edge out the opponents though.
