SRH look to return home from Mumbai with playoffs plans still intact

Surrey batters turn the screw after Dan Worrall six-for floors Worcestershire

Match detailsMumbai Indians (10th; W3, L8) vs Sunrisers Hyderabad (5th; W6, L4) Mumbai, 7.30pm IST (2pm GMT)Big picture

By the time Monday dawns, Mumbai Indians (MI) will either be out of the reckoning for the playoffs of IPL 2024, or all but. Heading into their last three games of the league phase, the most they can realistically hope for, in all likelihood, is to lift themselves off the bottom of the table, finish somewhere near its middle, and get a clear picture of who to retain and who to let go of before the big 2025 auction.

Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH), their opponents on Monday night, will have a lot more to play for. They are fifth at the end of Chennai Super Kings' win over Punjab Kings, and are in contention for a top-four finish with three home games to end the league phase after this trip to Mumbai. If the last ball of their most recent game - a one-run victory over Rajasthan Royals - had played out any differently, though, they might be looking a lot less secure, nursing the wounds of three back-to-back defeats.

On such results can hinge the fate of entire seasons. It feels especially true right now, with the playoffs race as tight as it is. With four games left, SRH will look to control everything they can control, and hope that enough of the 50-50 moments go their way to keep them near the front of the playoffs queue.

Form guide

Mumbai Indians LLLLW (last five completed games, most recent first)Sunrisers Hyderabad WLLWW

Previous meeting

This was the match that turned IPL 2024 into IPL 2024. The first seven games of the season had been, well, normal - just three 200-plus totals in 14 innings, with a highest of 208. Then SRH went and raised the ceiling for everyone, going crash, bang, wallop all the way to 277 for 3, the IPL's new record total. For a while it looked like the record would last only a few hours, as MI got to the halfway point of their chase at better than their original required rate, but SRH's bowlers held on through the back half to seal a 31-run win. The record wouldn't last too long anyway, as SRH themselves obliterated it 19 days later.

Team news and Impact Player strategy

Mumbai Indians Rohit Sharma was MI's Impact Player in their last game, against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), a back spasm forcing the team to use their ex-captain in this role. Rohit batted in the nets on both Saturday and Sunday and didn't look in any visible discomfort, and Naman Dhir said at Sunday's press conference that Rohit was "fit and fine". He should return to the starting XI if he is back to full fitness.

MI may also reconsider the idea of deploying just two overseas players: with Rohit designated to come off the bench as an almost mandatory impact sub, they were unable to use either Mohammad Nabi - whose offspin could have been very useful on a pitch where the part-timer Dhir ended up bowling three overs - or the big-hitting Romario Shepherd off the bench, so it felt like a waste to start neither of them.

Likely XII: 1 Rohit Sharma, 2 Ishan Kishan (wk), 3 Suryakumar Yadav, 4 Tilak Varma, 5 Hardik Pandya (capt), 6 Tim David, 7 Nehal Wadhera, 8 Romario Shepherd/Mohammad Nabi, 9 Gerald Coetzee, 10 Piyush Chawla, 11 Jasprit Bumrah, 12 Nuwan Thushara

Sunrisers Hyderabad SRH made a significant decision in their last game, leaving out the out-of-form Aiden Markram and bringing in the bowling allrounder Marco Jansen. They are likely to stick to that overseas combination at the Wankhede, with their last bowling pick - either Jaydev Unadkat, Umran Malik or Mayank Markande - likely to be conditions-dependent.

Likely XII: 1 Travis Head, 2 Abhishek Sharma, 3 Anmolpreet Singh, 4 Heinrich Klaasen (wk), 5 Nitish Kumar Reddy, 6 Abdul Samad, 7 Shahbaz Ahmed, 8 Marco Jansen, 9 Pat Cummins (capt), 10 Bhuvneshwar Kumar, 11 T Natarajan, 12 Jaydev Unadkat/Mayank Markande

In the spotlight

Rohit Sharma scored 261 runs at a strike rate of 167.31 and an average of 52.20 in his first six matches of IPL 2024. Since then, he has only made 65 runs in five innings, getting past 11 only once and falling four times to left-arm pace. How will he go against an SRH attack that could feature as many as three left-arm quicks in Jansen, T Natarajan and Unadkat?

When things fall into place for them, SRH's batting line-up is awe-inspiring. When the top order doesn't click, though, vulnerabilities begin to appear. SRH have more than adequate batting depth on paper to not let a couple of early wickets derail them, but that depth doesn't always translate into returns on the field. It's been particularly evident in run-chases this season. Perhaps what they need is for Abdul Samad, a batter of immense potential as well as frustrating limitations, to round out his game. While batting first, Samad is often the perfect end-overs finisher, but his game isn't always suited to situations that call for multiple gears against different styles of bowling. His record reflects this: he averages 34.66 and strikes at 236.36 while batting first this season, while going at 14.66 and 125.71 in chases. It's been a pattern over his IPL career too: batting first he's gone at 32.22 and 164.77, and while chasing those numbers drop to 14.88 and 133.15. His bowling-type numbers also tell a similar story: he has averaged 23.94 and struck at 174.49 against pace over his IPL career, while going at 16.00 and 94.11 against spin.

Stats that matterSRH's two most dangerous spin hitters have terrific records against Piyush Chawla. Abhishek Sharma has hit the legspinner for 40 runs in 16 balls in T20s while being dismissed twice, while Klaasen has hit him for 28 runs in 14 balls while being dismissed once.MI would love to have Tim David facing Natarajan in the death overs. So far, David has scored 47 off 16 balls from the left-arm quick without being dismissed.Travis Head is eight runs away from the 3000 mark in T20s.Bhuvneshwar Kumar needs three wickets to get to the milestone of 300 in T20s, while Unadkat is one short of 100 IPL wickets.Pitch and conditions

The Wankhede is usually characterised by high scores and tall run-chases, but the most recent game there, between MI and KKR, had a different flavour, with the spinners coming into their own. Chawla picked up 1 for 15 in three overs, while Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy returned identical figures of 4-0-22-2 for KKR. It remains to be seen if this was a sign of wearing pitches in the second half of the season or just a one-off.

Quotes

"In IPL every team is very competitive, so often 'home-ground advantage' is not the apt term. I won't say that SRH is going to score 250-plus again. We are a good bowling side so we'll try to restrict them."MI's Naman Dhir on the prospect of facing a side that could cash in on Wankhede's short boundaries

"That's always going to be an ongoing conversation but the way we pick our team is very much a game-to-game situation. We know the quality that someone like Umran has and it's a new venue and opposition tomorrow and obviously his name may come up in selection conversation."SRH bowling coach James Franklin on whether Malik, whose only game this IPL was against MI, could get a go.