Charged up Sunrisers to take on Mumbai Indians at Wankhede

Mumbai languishing in seventh place in the points table with just two wins this season so far

Mumbai: An inconsistent Mumbai Indians will hope that ace pacer Jasprit Bumrah returns to his menacing best, which is essential for them to stop an explosive Sunrisers Hyderabad batting unit in its tracks in a potentially high-scoring IPL match here on Thursday.

Coming off a three-month-long injury layoff, Bumrah has yet to find the accuracy, which makes him a tough customer to deal with. After a rather tidy outing against Royal Challengers Bengaluru, Bumrah struggled to nail his yorkers and was taken apart by Delhi Capitals’ Karun Nair as he leaked 44 runs in that game. The 31-year-old will face a stern test against a Sunrisers’ fearsome line-up comprising Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Ishan Kishan and Heinrich Klaasen. But the five-time champions will also want former captain Rohit Sharma to get back to his run-making ways at the earliest as his current tally is an underwhelming 56 runs from five matches at an average of 11.20.

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It has played a massive role in them languishing in seventh place in the points table with just two wins, and those results were largely built around the contributions of Suryakumar Yadav and Tilak Varma.

Rohit, who has persisted with his ultra-aggressive approach, has struggled against left-arm pace, but there could be some respite given that SRH don’t have any frontline left-arm seamers unless they bring in Jaydev Unadkat. While Suryakumar has still not been at his brutal best, being retired out against Lucknow Super Giants served as a wake-up call for Tilak. After that difficult outing in

Lucknow, Tilak responded with scores of 56 (29b) and 59 (33b) to indicate his return to form.

Naman Dhir remains a vital cog for MI as he has been given the role of an aggressor with the bat in the death overs, but otherwise, he has been their best fielder this season.

The way MI clinched a win from Delhi with accurate fielding might just ignite the missing spark in their camp. Interestingly, both MI and SRH were able to snap their disappointing run with impressive wins in their previous outings. But it remains to be seen if they are able to attain consistency, which will define their future in the competition.

SRH’s struggles

Nearing the halfway mark, the Sunrisers are also struggling to find their range, tottering at ninth on the table with only net run rate separating the two teams after four losses and two wins in six matches each. MI has an NRR of 0.10, while SRH’s run-rate stands at -1.24.

But MI will have to be wary of SRH’s batters, who have given signs of finding their mojo after a lull. Each of the top four — Head, Abhishek, Klaasen and Kishan — fired on all cylinders to stun Punjab Kings to give SRH their second win of the season.