Regrouped Delhi in way of Mumbai’s fifth IPL title

Mumbai Indians Skipper, Rohith Sharma (left) and Delhi Capitals Captain, Shreyas Iyer with the IPL trophy 

The 2020 Indian Premier League (IPL) season reaches its climax as the Mumbai Indians take on the Delhi Capitals in the final encounter in Dubai, United Arab Emirates today. 

The top two sides in the tournament’s pool stage have already met once in the playoffs, with Mumbai winning the first qualifier by 57 runs. 

That forced the Capitals into a second qualifier, against the Sunrisers Hyderabad, which they came through with a 17-run win in Abu Dhabi on Sunday.

Mumbai have been the tournament’s stand-out team, with Quinton de Kock and Ishan Kishan among the top five run-scorers while Jasprit Bumrah and Trent Boult have both been in magnificent form with the ball.  Delhi will be looking to the competition’s leading wicket-taker Kagiso Rabada and opener Shikhar Dhawan, who scored back-to-back centuries during the group stage. 

Delhi and Mumbai have faced each other thrice in the tournament, twice in the league stage and once in the playoffs and Mumbai have emerged victorious on all three occasions.

What will give Mumbai confidence, not that they don’t already have a lot of it, is that all the three victories were comprehensive. 

While they won the first league match against Delhi by five wickets, Mumbai registered a nine-wicket victory in their second group game against Delhi. 

Their victory in Qualifier One was as clinical as the Rohit Sharma-led side beat Delhi by a huge margin of 57 runs to book a playoff berth.

Mumbai’s campaign is going on autopilot and team does not need to do anything differently. If they play their best cricket on the night, despite Delhi’s resurgence, Mumbai have just too much prowess to get beaten.
The final also brings an opportunity for Sharma to score big in the most important game of the tournament and stake his claim for the Australia tour.

Hardik Pandya and Kieron Pollard remain key players for Mumbai as the finishers. They will expect both Trent Boult and Jasprit Bumrah to continue picking up early wickets.

(Agencies)

Probable playing XI
Mumbai Indians: Rohit Sharma (Captain), Quinton de Kock (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Ishan Kishan, Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard, Krunal Pandya, Nathan Coulter-Nile, Rahul Chahar, Trent Boult and Jasprit Bumrah.
Delhi Capitals: Shreyas Iyer (Captain), Marcus Stoinis, Shikhar Dhawan, Ajinkya Rahane, Rishabh Pant (wk), Shimron Hetmyer, Axar Patel, Ravichandran Ashwin, Praveen Dubey, Kagiso Rabada and Anrich Nortje.