Last chance for Bangalore to please home crowds!

Bangalore: The inaugural T20 league moves to the final stage of excitement where all the remaining teams will desperately fight for the title. The League caravan rolls from one stage to another providing tremendous entertainment and joy to millions of fans of this wonderful game.

In its more ripe stage, today there will be a match between Bangalore and Mumbai. Both the teams are already out of the semi finals. The match will be the last chance for Bangalore to please its fans. Same applies to Mumbai as well. The match between Bangalore and Mumbai at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium pits two teams that are eyeing victory just to save some pride.

Rahul Dravid’s team has been able to garner only eight points from 13 matches. The bitterest thing is that Team got only one win from six matches at home! The home crowd must be a dejected lot so today’s match gives a chance to the team to gladden the fans in their last performance.

This is the opportunity for the home side to finish its lackluster campaign with a victory and offer some cheer to the local fans. New hopes have been rekindled in the team with key local players like Vinay Kumar and B. Akhil belatedly chipping in. The last two victories have already ensured that Bangalore team would finish seventh in an eight-team league.

The batsmen of the team need to come up with consistent performance today. It will not be an easy walk against Mumbai which supports players like Jayasuriya and Tendulkar. On the bowling side, team has some experienced Pandits of the game but they will have to come up without pressure and with cool heads to conquer Mumbai.

Meanwhile, Mumbai has met some nerve-wracking losses especially the last one against Rajasthan. Chennai’s victory last evening, dashed the hopes of Mumbai who will play their last match today as they are now out of semi-final contention.

They will also be under pressure to win the match but still Mumbai looks as the favorite for today’s match. This is a team which has incredible experienced players in Tendulkar, Pollock and Jayasuriya. Team has the needed powerful attack in bowling side as well. The most interesting aspect will be how the crowd will react to local player Uthappa coming to the turf in Mumbai’s jersey.

Weather appears dicey today as on Tuesday afternoon, thundershowers washed out Bangalore’s practice session. So today too the weather may take the final call!
The teams (from):
Bangalore: Rahul Dravid (Capt.), Mark Boucher, Cameron White, Bharat Chipli, Abdur Razzak, Shreevats Goswami, Wasim Jaffer, Sunil Joshi, Jacques Kallis, Zaheer Khan, Virat Kohli, Praveen Kumar, Anil Kumble, Misbah-ul-Haq, Devraj Patil, Dale Steyn, B. Akhil, K.P. Appanna, J. Arun Kumar and Vinay Kumar.

Mumbai: Sachin Tendulkar (Capt.), Sanath Jayasuriya, Dominic Thornely, Robin Uthappa, Abhishek Nayar, Shaun Pollock, Dilhara Fernando, Yogesh Takawale, Dhaval Kulkarni, Rohan Raje, Ashish Nehra, Andre Nel, Dwayne Smith, Rajesh Pawar and Saurabh Tiwary.