Time for Sachin-Warne battle (Preview)

An old rivalry will be revived on the cricket field when dominating Mumbai take on giant-killers Rajasthan at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium on Friday. Two supremely gifted cricketers of our times- Sachin Tendulkar and Shane Warne would face each other in a potentially riveting encounter.

The little master and Warne battle has always been a marquee duel of modern cricket with Sachin getting better of the leggie on most occasions. Warne of late has been bowling very well and Sachin is the ‘Orange Cap’ holder, the fascinating contest between the two would surely be the focus of one and all.

Individuals apart, Jaipur would see a battle between the tournament’s best side and another fighting inconsistency. Stationed fourth at the points table, Rajasthan were off to a winning start this season and then things fell apart for Warne led side losing three games and forced to share points with Bangalore in a washout game. Rajasthan, though, had a comprehensive and morale boosting win  over Kochi last home game thanks to Warne magic who ripped heart out of visiting team to bundle them to an under par score.

An exceptional performance with the ball followed a similar act with the bat to round off the impressive game for the side. The refreshing sign for the team management definitely would have been star all-rounder Shane Watson finally getting finally among the runs and that too in a dominating fashion. All revitalizing developments augur well for the side that doesn’t boast of too many big guns.

Living true to its billing, Mumbai have rolled over their opponents, save for Kochi that stunned Sachin’s side by chasing down a mammoth total, and deservedly standing at the top. The power packed have come to the party with Sachin and emerging Ambati Rayudu at the top and Rohit Sharma and Andrew Symonds doing bulk of the runs scoring.

Bowling unit led by slinger Lasith Malinga has been sensational making it difficult for opponent batsmen to score off them. Fielding has been top notch as well and most of cricket pundits wouldn’t disagree with the fact that the current Mumbai side looks a champion material.

RAJASTHAN

Players who can make impact…

Shane Warne…Spin wizard has had a many battles with the master blaster Sachin and the latter has topped most of them. Rajasthan skipper would be keen to have Sachin’s wicket and put Mumbai on the backfoot.  A mouth watering battle is on cards when Warne bowls to likes of Kieran Pollard, Rohit Sharma and Andrew Symonds, all of whom can tong the ball high and long.

Ross Taylor…New Zealand’s best batsman is yet to set IPL on fire this season with the bat. However, Rosco will be itching to display some fireworks and there is no better platform than a home fixture and tournament’s most formidable bowling attack to play against. 

SQUAD

Aakash Chopra, Abhishek Raut, Aditya Dole, Ajinkya Rahane, Amit Paunikar, Amit Singh, Ankeet Chavan, Ashok Menaria, Deepak Chahar, Dinesh Salunkhe, Dishant Yagnik, Faiz Fazal, Johan Botha, Nayan Doshi, Pankaj Singh, Pinal Shah, Rahul Dravid, Ross Taylor, Samad Fallah, Shane Warne (c), Shane Watson, Shaun Tait, Siddharth Trivedi, Stuart Binny, Sumit Narwal, Swapnil Asnodkar 

MUMBAI

Players who can make impact…

Sachin Tendulkar….The master has blasted almost every bowler in the tournament and Warne may have to come up with his best performance to tilt the battle in his favour. Sachin however knows most of the weapons in the spin visits armoury.

Rohit Sharma...Elegant right hander finally came to the party by hitting two classy half-centuries in back to back games and both the knocks coming when Mumbai was on a backfoot. His timing and placement has been second to none and if repeats his batting heroics on Friday then Rajasthan will be in for a trouble.

 SQUAD

Abu Nechim , Aditya Tare (wk), Aiden Blizzard, Ali Murtaza,  Ambati Rayudu, Andrew Symonds, Davy Jacobs, Dhawal Kulkarni, Harbhajan Singh, James Franklin, Kieron Pollard, Lasith Malinga, Moises Henriques, Munaf Patel, Pawan Suyal, Rajagopal Sathish, Rohit Sharma, Sachin Tendulkar (c), Santosh Yadav, Sarul Kanwar, Tirumalsetti Suman, Yuzvendra Chahal