Hardik Pandya didn’t bother with too much chat at the toss. “We will bat first,” he said, and that really was that. It left Ruturaj Gaikwad shrugging – “We’d have batted first as well” – before the two captains wandered off to sort their line-ups.
So Mumbai Indians will try to lay down a score on a surface that, earlier in the year, hosted India’s 256 for 4 against Zimbabwe in the T20 World Cup. Hardik reckons the strip is still “pretty similar”, good enough for stroke-making if the top order settles quickly. Chepauk’s most recent IPL outing suggested as much: Punjab chased 210 here with an over to spare.
Neither MS Dhoni nor Rohit Sharma has healed in time for what people keep labelling the IPL’s El Clasico. Their absence knocks a fair bit of nostalgia out of the evening but, given the tournament schedule, rest always felt the sensible call.
Even so, there’s fresh intrigue. MI have awarded an IPL cap to 22-year-old wrist-spinner Raghu Sharma, pace bowler Krish Bhagat also returning after a fortnight cooling his heels. Raghu received his cap from Hardik a few minutes before the anthems – he’s tipped to swap in as the Impact player once MI switch to defence. No Ashwani Kumar or Shardul Thakur today.
CSK, still juggling combinations, have given a first outing to Ramakrishna Ghosh, the Maharashtra all-rounder who swings it in at decent pace and has a reputation for tidy death overs. Left-arm spinning all-rounder Prashant Veer is back as well. Out go Gurjapneet Singh and Akeal Hosein despite Hosein’s four-for at the Wankhede. One of Sarfaraz Khan, Kartik Sharma or perhaps even Matt Short (CSK are only fielding three overseas players) is expected to appear as the batting-boost Impact pick once the chase begins.
Quick score-card style glance at the XIs:
Chennai Super Kings (fielding first): Sanju Samson (wk), Ruturaj Gaikwad (c), Urvil Patel, Dewald Brevis, Shivam Dube, Jamie Overton, Ramakrishna Ghosh, Prashant Veer, Noor Ahmad, Anshul Kamboj, Mukesh Choudhary.
Impact options: Kartik Sharma, Akeal Hosein, Sarfaraz Khan, Matt Short, Gurjapneet Singh.
Mumbai Indians (batting first): Ryan Rickelton (wk), Will Jacks, Naman Dhir, Suryakumar Yadav, Tilak Varma, Hardik Pandya (c), Robin Minz, Krish Bhagat, Trent Boult, Jasprit Bumrah, AM Ghazanfar.
Impact options: Raj Bawa, Raghu Sharma, Mayank Rawat, Shardul Thakur, Ashwani Kumar.
MI’s attack looks the heavier one on paper – Boult with the new ball, Bumrah in those unpleasant middle-overs – but Chepauk has turned plenty in late April and early May. If Raghu does get on, how quickly he settles could swing plenty.
For CSK, Jamie Overton’s seam and Dewald Brevis’s busy middle-order hitting feel central. But most eyes are on Ghosh – an unfussy inswinger, a punchy lower-order bat, and the sort of cricketer this competition keeps uncovering.
Either way, the first hour should tell us how much of that February run-fest remains in the pitch – and whether Hardik’s call at the toss was the right one.
