Lucknow Super Giants and Punjab Kings are neither on a rise nor on a decline. They are inconsistent. Not surprisingly, in a tightly-packed points table, they are mid-tablers like Rajasthan Royals and Royal Challengers Bangalore – only separated by Net Run Rate. Royals have the chance to do on Thursday (April 27) what LSG and PBKS will want to achieve on Friday (April 28) when they face each other – breakaway from the middle-muddle. Both teams have won four of their seven games, and are desperately looking to move away from that tug of war, and rise to where Gujarat Titans and Chennai Super Kings are placed.
Both teams have travelled to Mohali for their next contest at the back of contrasting shows in their previous game – LSG squandered a dominant position at home to lose against GT in a low-scoring thriller while PBKS held their nerves against Mumbai Indians in a high-scoring encounter at the Wankhede Stadium.
To be expected – The temperature is expected to remain on the cooler side with cloudy conditions. Barring the opening game, in which PBKS smashed 191, most other teams have registered scores in the range of 150-175.
Probable XI PBKS: Atharva Taide, Harpreet Singh Bhatia, Sam Curran (c), Jitesh Sharma (wk), Shahrukh Khan, Harpreet Brar, Nathan Ellis, Rahul Chahar, Arshdeep Singh,Matthew Short,Liam Livingstone.
Probable XI of LSG: KL Rahul (c), Quinton de Kock, Deepak Hooda, Marcus Stoinis, Krunal Pandya, Nicholas Pooran (wk), Ayush Badoni, Naveen-ul-Haq, Shivam Mavi, Ravi Bishnoi, Avesh Khan.
