IPL 2018: Mumbai Indians' probable XI for their season opener against CSK

The defending champions Mumbai Indians will start their campaign in IPL 11 against the two-time champions Chennai Super Kings on 7th of April. It’s a much-anticipated encounter as both the teams assembled decent squads in the auction and it, in all likelihood, should be a closely fought contest. Mumbai Indians, since they are playing at home, will have a slight edge, but CSK have always been a fantastic away performer. So the hosts will have to be at the top of their game to beat the men in yellow.

It will be a headache for the Mumbai skipper Rohit Sharma to pick his playing XI as he has got a number of quality players at his disposal, both domestic and international, and ignoring any of them will be difficult. But a few of them, unfortunately, will have to be on the bench for starters, while the rest will have the first bite of the cherry.

Here are the 11 players we think will form the playing XI of Mumbai Indians for their season opener:

Openers (Ishan Kishan (WK), Evin Lewis)

Ishan Kishan has had a good domestic season in white-ball cricket

Ishan Kishan went for more than Rs 6 crore in the auction and it was hardly surprising. He is tipped to be an international star for India in the future and he has shown time and again in the domestic circuit that people who have rated him highly have done so for a reason. He showed the glimpses of his talent in the previous IPL playing for the Gujarat Lions and he is someone whom Mumbai would have high hopes on.

Evin Lewis needs no introduction as far as T20s are concerned. The West Indian is probably the most destructive batsman in the shortest format of the game at the moment and already has 2 hundreds to his name in international T20 cricket. If he gets going at the top of the order, there is nowhere to hide for the bowlers as he will smash everything out of the ground.

Middle Order (Rohit Sharma (C), Suryakumar Yadav)

Suryakumar Yadav used to bat lower down the order for KKR

Rohit generally likes to open the innings in white ball cricket, but with Kishan and Lewis already available, he will probably bat at 3. Rohit is a wonderful player of spin and if he is around in the middle overs, he will make sure he manipulates the strike properly and gets those boundaries at regular intervals to set a good tempo and prepare a launch-pad for a big finish later on.

Suryakumar Yadav is a new signing for Mumbai. He used to bat lower down the order for his previous franchise KKR, but for Mumbai he might get to bat at 4. The 27-year-old is an innovative 360-degree player and hits the ball in unusual areas of the ground. He can reverse sweep the spinners and can reverse paddle the fast bowlers. He can switch-hit as well and can also play the scoop over the keeper’s head. He is another player who doesn’t let the scoring rate dip during his presence at the crease.

All-rounders (Kieron Pollard, Krunal Pandya, Hardik Pandya)

Kieron Pollard has been a game changer for Mumbai Indians on many occasions

Kieron Pollard has been one of the all-time greatest match-winners for Mumbai. He has been in and around their set-up for 8 years now and has played a lot of game-changing innings for the franchise. He might not be the most consistent with the bat, but he comes good in big games more often than not. Mumbai do not have a better finisher than him in the squad and his spot in the XI is an absolute certainty.

The Pandya brothers have made a huge difference for MI in the last couple of seasons. Since both of them are all-rounders, they bring great balance to the line-up. While Hardik is an established India player now, Krunal has also been knocking on the doors of the national team in limited-overs cricket and both will be keen to make useful contributions for Mumbai again, both with bat and ball.

Spinner (Akila Dananjaya)

Akila Dananjaya got a 6-

fer

in an ODI game against India last year

Akila Dananjaya will be the sole specialist spinner in the XI. The 24-year-old Sri Lankan has been one of the top bowlers in T20 cricket of late. He is originally an off-spinner, but he has got a bit of mystery about him. He can bowl a googly without changing his action and has outfoxed a lot of batsmen with that delivery.

Dananjaya’s stock ball is the off-spinner and that’s the delivery he generally relies on, but the control he has got over his googly is unbelievable considering the fact that he is not a leggie. His googly dips into the right-handers and lures them into their shots a tad early, allowing the ball to sneak between the bat and pad quite often. It’s because of the mystery element that Dananjaya carries that he is one of the bowlers to watch out for this IPL.

Fast bowlers (Jasprit Bumrah, Mustafizur Rahman, Pradeep Sangwan)

Jasprit Bumrah has been one of Mumbai's mainstays in the recent times

Jasprit Bumrah has been a mainstay of the Mumbai bowling attack for some time now and a lot will lie on his shoulders in terms of how Mumbai fare with the ball in IPL 11. He will bowl both up front as well as in the death and will hold the key for Mumbai.

Pradeep Sangwan will mostly be used with the new ball as he can shape it into the right-handers and away from the lefties and he can do it at pace. In one of the games that he played for the Gujarat Lions last season, he got Steve Smith and Ajinkya Rahane out in the very first over of the innings which was a testament to his quality.

Mustafizur Rahman will have a role in the middle and latter part of the innings with the slightly softer ball. He has a bag full of tricks in terms of his change-ups and the natural angle that he creates for a left-armer from over-the-wicket only makes it more difficult for the batsmen to negotiate his cutters and other variations. He bowls good Yorkers as well and will probably bowl with Bumrah in tandem from the 17th to the 20th over.