Mumbai to play for pride, Delhi for momentum

The Conditions The ground has seen consistently good battles between bat and ball, and is expected to be the same for the final league matches too. The forecast is for a partly sunny, partly cloudy day, and the seam bowlers will be hoping the clouds come on when they're bowling as it would make the conditions slightly more favourable to them.

The Teams After what seems like an eternity, we have an inconsequential match in the tournament, in the sense that the result of this match will neither affect Delhi's standing at the top of the table, nor give Mumbai any chance of qualifying for the semi-finals.

Mumbai Indians: Even though they're out of the semi-finals, they would want to win here so that they go above Rajasthan in the final points tally. They will be ruing their missed chances in a few close games, which has left them with no hope of a semis berth. Their problem has been that they have rarely fired as a team, and rode on individual performances to get their victories. Their exit must hurt them, because before the tournament they had looked amongst the best balanced teams on paper, but sadly that strength stayed on paper. Their bowling has suffered in Zaheer's absence and it doesn't look likely that he will play this match, and risk worsening his injury before the World T20 cup. Overall, a disappointing outing for them, which they would like to redeem with a win against the league leaders.

Delhi Daredevils: They would be eager to get back to their winning ways after the reverses against Punjab and Bangalore. However, that will not happen on a consistent basis unless Gautam Gambhir and Virender Sehwag find their form and do it fast. It is unreasonable to expect de Villiers, Dilshan and Dinesh Karthik to bail Delhi out of trouble in every single match. Delhi can thank their stars that they have done it so far, but they need a more wholesome contribution from their openers. Glenn McGrath has still not got a game, and with this being the last league game, and Delhi giving chances to those on the bench, he might hope to finally make the playing eleven. If he doesn't, it will be a very strange decision indeed, and one which Virender Sehwag ought to perhaps explain.

Contest to Watch

Lasith Malinga versus T Dilshan - The Sri Lankan team-mates have been stand-out performers for their respective teams, but Dilshan has been part of a successful outfit, while Malinga has lost more often than he has won. However, their individual performances have been top-class, and if the two do face-off in the middle, it will be an intriguing contest.

Contest that fans would wish to watch

Glenn McGrath versus Sachin Tendulkar - Every fan who has watched cricket from the mid-nineties to the mid-200s, will want to watch what used to be amongst the most classic contests in all cricket - be it Test matches, ODIs or even if these two stalwarts ever came face to face in club cricket or a 'galli' match! One more time, one last time - we want to see them go at each other.

Numbers Game:

85 - The number of runs by which AB de Villiers has outscored the combined totals of Gautam Gambhir and Virender Sehwag. de Villiers has 429 runs while the opening duo have 348 (Gambhir 239 and Sehwag 109).

1 - JP Duminy's rank in the 'Best Economy Rate' charts for the Mumbai Indians. He is also by far their leading run scorer in the tournament, and has proved to be worth every dollar of the massive 950,000 shelled out for him.

Teams:

Delhi Daredevils (From): Virender Sehwag(c), Gautam Gambhir, AB de Villiers, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Dinesh Karthik(w), Andrew McDonald, Rajat Bhatia, Amit Mishra, Pradeep Sangwan, Ashish Nehra, Dirk Nannes, Daniel Vettori, Mithun Manhas, Aavishkar Salvi, Vijaykumar Yo Mahesh, Glenn McGrath, Manoj Kumar Tiwary, David Warner, Farveez Maharoof, Owais Shah, Paul Collingwood, Tejashwi Yadav, Umesh Yadav, Yogesh Nagar

Mumbai Indians (From): Sachin Tendulkar(c), Sanath Jayasuriya, Ajinkya Rahane, Jean-Paul Duminy, Abhishek Nayar, Ryan McLaren, Yogesh Takawale(w), Harbhajan Singh, Chetanya Nanda, Dhawal Kulkarni, Lasith Malinga, Rohan Raje, Shikhar Dhawan, Zaheer Khan, Pinal Shah, Dilhara Fernando, Graham Napier, Jaydev Shah, Kyle Mills, Luke Ronchi, Mohammad Ashraful, Rahil Shaikh, Saurabh Tiwary

CSK send Punjab almost out of contention

That's it Punjab choked under pressure. It was a must win game for them and they flunked it big time. They were under no pressure as it was a low target, but the spinners did it for CSK. The spinners bowled a total of 12 overs for 38 runs and took 6 wickets. That is where the Punjab side lost it. Now they need Bangalore to lose heavily against Hyderabad tomorrow to go through to the semi-finals. They are virtually tetering on the brink.

Muralitharan: Dhoni asked me to bowl early on today, I stuck to the right line and length and got wickets. The other bowlers maintained the pressure and that helped. Raina has done a good job for us in so many matches. Semi-Finals are big games, the one who performs well will win, it's that kind of a contest.

Dhoni: Well, ofcourse, the bowlers were brilliant. We picked Ashwin for the first time, he was shuffled a lot but he still managed to bowl well. Murali was outstanding and so was Raina. The pacers managed it well too. Battingwise, we are a good side, it was just one of those days when we didn't click. We were a couple of batsmen short, Haydos wasn't there and Albie has injured himself. Once they get back, it should be good for us.

Yuvraj: Yeah, we're pretty disappointed, we needed to win to go into the Semi-Finals, unfortunately we couldn't do it. I think we had a decent start, we just didn't get a partnership, none of our batsmen got a 40 or 50. Well, we have had a lot of injuries coming into this tournament, everyone has performed the role assigned to them. It has been a bits and pieces tournament for us, when you are in a good position, one needs to nail the opposition. We couldn't do it.

Muttiah Muralitharan is the Man of the Match for his spell of 2/8 in 4 overs.

Today's win by CSK keeps their unbeaten record against Punjab intact. CSK have now won all the 5 matches against Punjab in the IPL.

Match #54 Preview: Chennai Super King vs Kings XI Punjab

Ground Reality and Pitch:

Having witnessed 14 matches played so far at the Kingsmead, the players would be familiar with the pitch and the ground conditions. Although it is not a easy scoring pitch, intelligent batting have helped the batsmen prosper at this ground. With the pitch offering consistent bounce, it would be an even contest between bat and ball.

Temperatures: Min - 60F Max - 74F Conditions: Partly Cloudy

Team Updates:

Chennai: With a semifinal berth at stake, Chennai Super Kings, smarting from a stunning defeat to tournament-laggards Kolkata Knight Riders, take on Kings XI Punjab in a do-or-die encounter. Chennai are currently placed second with 15 points after notching up seven wins from 13 matches. Even without their run-machine Matthew Hayden, Chennai posted 188 against the Kolkata team but couldn't defend the total, due to poor bowling. For Chennai, orange cap winner Hayden has done the bulk of scoring and Dhoni would desperately want him back in the squad. Skipper Dhoni would hope his team shrugs off the disappointment of the loss to Kolkata and comes out firing all cylinders against Punjab.

Punjab: Currently placed fifth on the points table, Punjab is battling inconsistent batting form of the top order. Sri Lankan import Kumar Sangakkara is doing the bulk of scoring while their opening pair of Sunny Sohal and Simon Katich and Yuvraj Singh in the middle order have failed to provide the impetus. Punjab has depended more on their bowlers to defend low totals, with all-rounder Irfan Pathan leading the pack with 15 wickets and Yusuf Abdulla and Piyush Chawla bagging 14 and 11 wickets respectively. A part-time spinner, Yuvraj himself has been in ominous form with the ball, picking up two hat-tricks so far in IPL II and he would hope to continue with the good work.

Contest to watch:

Hayden vs. Sreesanth: The maverick seamer has had a tough couple of matches while beginnings his IPL campaign, though he has come back well during the matches against Delhi and and Hyderabad. His first encounter with Hayden saw the bulky Australian score heavily against him. Sreesanth would hope to extract his revenge while Punjab face-off Chennai at Durban.

Numbers game:

3: The number of sixers hit by Hayden off Sreesanth during Chennai's previous encounter with Punjab.

8.89: Sreesanth's economy rate during this season of the IPL.

Sound Bytes:

It is disappointing to lose the match. We had (enough) runs on the board (to defend) but they (Kolkata) had some brilliant batting and on the other hand we had one of the worst bowling performance in the IPL: MS Dhoni after the team's loss to Kolkata

Teams:

Chennai Super Kings (From): Matthew Hayden, Parthiv Patel, Suresh Raina, Mahendra Singh Dhoni(w/c), Subramaniam Badrinath, Albie Morkel, Jacob Oram, Sudeep Tyagi, Shadab Jakati, Laxmipathy Balaji, Muttiah Muralitharan, Joginder Sharma, Manpreet Gony, Arun Karthik, George Bailey, Makhaya Ntini, Mike Hussey, Murali Vijay, Palani Amarnath, Ravichandran Ashwin, Thilan Thushara, Viraj Kadbe

Match #51 Preview : Kolkata Knight Riders vs Chennai Super Kings

Ground Reality: Most of the matches played here have seen an even contest between bat and ball, and more of the same is expected today. With light winds, and sunny weather forecasted, the day should be fine for cricket.

The Teams: It seems like an unequal battle on the face of it, with one team looking formidable, and the other looking forlorn. This will be the first meeting between the teams, since their previous match was rained out.

Kolkata Knight Riders: They must now be firmly convinced that they are cursed or that someone has put a spell on them. No matter what they do, they just can't seem to win a match, often being extremely unlucky or being at the receiving end of some brilliant innings. It is highly commendable that McCullum has still managed to put on a brave face and not lost his smile, since a lesser man would have wilted long ago beneath the pressure. However, being tough does is not the only quality that goes into making a good captain, and Kolkata would be wondering if Buchanan's orchestrated removal of Ganguly has not hampered them largely. It is tempting and easy to think that had Ganguly been leading, a lot of the close matches would have fallen the Knight Riders' way.

Chennai Super Kings: Even though they have almost sealed their semi-final spot, they will not relax an inch against Kolkata. For one, they would want to keep their winning momentum, and for another, with the table still so close, no one knows how one loss will affect teams later. However, the batting is still too dependant on Hayden - which is a worrying sign for a side that has players like Dhoni, Badrinath and Raina. They are all in the mix for being regulars in the Indian team, but they need to take more responsibility. Makhaya Ntini could get his first game today instead of Jacob Oram.

X Factor:

Brendon McCullum - The Kolkata skipper has looked like getting back into his best form for the past few matches, and if he does explode, then there is little the opposition can do. Just ask Bangalore.

Shadab Jakati - He has arrived with a big splash, but the key to being successsful is maintaining his initial form, after the opposition has had time to study and sort him out. He looks capable of doing it, and against a team that is struggling, should be looking to make a good contribution.

Numbers Game:

7 - The number of matches that Chennai has won this year, which is equal to the total number of matches Kolkata has won last year and this year.

2 - The position on Kolkata's run charts of its much maligned skipper Brendon McCullum. It says a lot about the team, that even though he has struggled for a large part of the tournament, McCullum is still its second highest run scorer.

Teams:

Chennai Super Kings (From): Matthew Hayden, Parthiv Patel, Suresh Raina, Mahendra Singh Dhoni(w/c), Subramaniam Badrinath, Jacob Oram, Albie Morkel, Sudeep Tyagi, Laxmipathy Balaji, Shadab Jakati, Muttiah Muralitharan, Joginder Sharma, Manpreet Gony, Arun Karthik, George Bailey, Makhaya Ntini, Mike Hussey, Murali Vijay, Palani Amarnath, Ravichandran Ashwin, Thilan Thushara, Viraj Kadbe

Kolkata Knight Riders (From): Brendon McCullum(c), Saurav Ganguly, Bradley Hodge, David Hussey, Wriddhiman Saha(w), Yashpal Singh, Ajit Agarkar, Mashrafe Mortaza, Murali Kartik, Ishant Sharma, Shoaib Shaikh, Laxmi Shukla, Ajantha Mendis, Charl Langeveldt, Aditya Dole, Ameya Shrikhande, Abhisek Banerjee, Angelo Mathews, Moises Henriques, Anureet Singh, Anustup Majumdar, Arindam Ghosh, Ashok Dinda, Avik Chowdhury, Bhavik Thaker, Chetan Suryavanshi, Debabrata Das, Dhiran Salvi, Gaurav Chabra, Gnaneswara Rao, Iqbal Abdulla, Ishwar Choudhary, Kshemal Waingankar, Mark Cameron, Mohammad Sanuth, Mohnish Parmar, Murtuza Hussain, Natraj Behera, Rajesh Verma, Ranadeb Bose, Rohan Banerjee, Sachin Rana, Sanjay Bangar, Sanjib Sanyal, Saurasish Lahiri, Shatrunjay Gaekwad, Sheldon Jackson, Siddarth Kaul, Sourav Sarkar, Sunny Singh, Vinit Indulkar, Morne van Wyk