Mohali, May 3 (IANS) Mumbai Indians captain Rohit Sharma has won the toss and elected to bowl first against Punjab Kings in match 46 of IPL 2023 at the IS Bindra PCA Stadium here on Wednesday.
Punjab are at sixth place in the points table, while Mumbai are at seventh position. The last time these two teams met in the competition, Punjab won by 13 runs in a successful defence of 214 at the Wankhede Stadium on April 22.
After winning the toss, Rohit said uncapped India pacer Akash Madhwal, who plays for Uttarakhand in domestic cricket, replaces injured Australia fast bowler Riley Meredith in the playing eleven. “It’s a good pitch, we have chased down targets pretty well, so will stick to our strengths. You always want to have a score in front of you on such pitches.”
“It’s important to keep the balance, we have played enough IPL games, things can change quickly. You can see how tight the table is. It’s important to focus on what we can do as a team. It’s all about coming fresh into the game and try to execute your plans.”
Punjab skipper Shikhar Dhawan said Matthew Short and Nathan Ellis replace Atharva Taide and Kagiso Rabada, though the latter is named in the substitutes. “We would have bowled first too. I feel the wicket looks good, it’s not dry, won’t change much.”
“It’s good to bat first and post a big total, looking forward to it. We keep the energy calm and relaxed. Mentally you need to be relaxed, as a leader I need to make sure of it.”
Playing XIs
Mumbai Indians: Rohit Sharma (captain), Ishan Kishan (wicketkeeper), Cameron Green, Tilak Varma, Tim David, Nehal Wadhera, Jofra Archer, Piyush Chawla, Kumar Kartikeya Singh, Akash Madhwal and Arshad Khan
Substitutes: Suryakumar Yadav, Dewald Brevis, Tristan Stubbs, Vishnu Vinod and Ramandeep Singh
Punjab Kings: Prabhsimran Singh, Shikhar Dhawan (captain), Matthew Short, Liam Livingstone, Jitesh Sharma (wicketkeeper), Sam Curran, Shahrukh Khan, Harpreet Brar, Rishi Dhawan, Rahul Chahar and Arshdeep Singh
Substitutes: Nathan Ellis, Sikandar Raza, Atharva Taide, Mohit Rathee and Shivam Singh
–IANS
nr/cs
