RCB host Mumbai in Raipur with the IPL back at the venue and MI staring at elimination
The IPL returns to Raipur after a decade on Sunday evening as Royal Challengers Bengaluru host Mumbai Indians at the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh International Stadium, with one team trying to break a slide and the other one defeat away from being knocked out of the tournament.
RCB sit fourth on 12 points from 10 matches, still in the playoff conversation but in need of a clean win after losing to Lucknow at the Ekana on Thursday. Mumbai are ninth on six points from 10 and lose their season if they lose tonight. Hardik Pandya is back in camp after the back spasm that kept him out of MI's previous game and is expected to lead, lifting the captaincy uncertainty that hung over Mumbai all week.
RCB looking to find their April rhythm
Bengaluru have lost three of their last five going into this match, including a nine-run defeat to Lucknow in a rain-curtailed 19-overs-per-side contest at the Ekana. Rajat Patidar's 61 and Tim David's 40 took them to 203 for 6 chasing 213, and Virat Kohli's second-ball duck to Prince Yadav left the chase under pressure throughout. Kohli has 379 runs in the tournament and tends to lift in tight finishes, and that is the curve RCB will be banking on as the playoff race tightens around them.
Mumbai's path is straightforward, the maths is not
Mumbai need to win all four of their remaining league matches to give themselves a chance of sneaking into the top four, and even then they will need other results to fall their way and a friendly net run rate calculation. Hardik's return restores the captaincy and the all-rounder option that Mumbai missed against Lucknow, and Rohit Sharma and Ryan Rickelton will need to repeat the powerplay tone-setting that has carried Mumbai's better wins this season.
Raipur, a venue out of memory
Raipur last hosted an IPL game in 2016, and only two T20Is have been played here since January 2018, so neither side is walking onto familiar territory. The Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh pitches have traditionally been on the slower side, but reports out of the ground point to a true batting deck for Sunday, possibly affected by the rain that fell across the city on Saturday. Toss is at 7.00pm IST with a 7.30pm IST start.
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