Preview PBKS vs MI IPL 2021, Match 16, April 23rd, MA Chidambaram Stadium. PBKS vs MI head to head player stats and records. Team news and match predictions for PBKS vs MI.
Key match stats PBKS vs MI preview
Venue Stats – MA Chidambaram Stadium
- Average first innings: 164
- Average first innings winning score: 173
- Average powerplay score: 47
- All-time win % batting 1st vs batting 2nd: 62% / 37%
Find full venue stats and records here
Team form PBKS vs MI preview
- PBKS – LLLW
- MI – LWWL
- Previous meetings: IPL 2020, MI won by 48 runs, PBKS won by Super Over
IPL 2021 PBKS vs MI preview
The situation for PBKS is looking pretty bleak coming into this match, 3 straight defeats that have involved a couple of batting collapses and no real sense of cohesion in their plans with ball in hand suggest that this is likely to be another frustrating season that’ll see them miss out on the top 4 again.
The defeat to SRH just a couple of days ago further highlighted the problems PBKS have balancing their team, particularly on pitches such as those that we are seeing at MA Chidambaram Stadium. I have to say that their team selection on Wednesday looked like one of hope rather than expectation that they’d get a result at this venue and it’s difficult to see how they’ll turn things around in the space of just 48 hours. From a personal point of view, it might be nice to see the 2 England players get a game and surely the continued failures of West Indies duo Pooran and Gayle can’t go unnoticed for much longer.
As for MI, they really rather self-destructed in their match against DC. I wonder if given their recent record against the Capitals it was as much a matter of over confidence after their fast start but given what we’ve seen before at MA Chidambaram Stadium it certainly seemed naive of their middle order to expect that they’d just be able to keep on hitting as the wickets began to tumble. 15 more runs in that first innings would probably have put them ahead of the game and with Rahul Chahar looking dangerous in the middle overs and then Bumrah and Boult to finish, no score is too small to defend for them albeit that their batsmen could really try helping out a little bit more!
PBKS vs MI head to head player stats
PBKS bowling vs MI batting head to head
MI’s tactics on this pitch have been to come out hard in the powerplay and that is almost certainly the right way to go albeit that they have become reckless during the middle over periods at times and failed to have one of their top order go on bat through the majority of the innings. You can bet that they’ll be looking to rectify that this time around and they come up against a PBKS team that is leaking runs in the powerplay and struggling to get wickets at the same time.
| Mumbai Indians run rate in the powerplay IPL 2021 | Punjab Kings bowling economy in the powerplay IPL 2021 |
| 8.00 | 8.50 |
The economy rate for PBKS is a particularly damning stat considering that they’ve played 3 games at the Wankhede where the majority of teams have found it harder going early on in their innings.
We noted in our season preview for MI that Quinton de Kock was not likely to enjoy batting in Chennai and so it has proved with the South African left-hander struggling with the slower pace. If there is any consolation for de Kock in this match, it’s that he comes up against a bowling attack low on confidence and of course, he’ll get to try his luck on a different wicket after this game!
Head to head wise, Mohammed Shami can at least point to the fact that he has a good record against the 2 Pandya brothers neither of whom has managed to have much of an impact on previous IPL 2021 fixtures with the bat.
Indeed PBKS’s best chance in this match will be to take early wickets and put an underperforming MI middle and lower order under pressure.
MI bowling vs PBKS batting head to head
The MI bowling attack is being brilliantly lead by their 2 frontline seamers Trent Boult and Jasprit Bumrah. Sides seem happy to simply survive against Bumrah at both ends of the innings with his economy rate in the powerplay the best in IPL 2021 as things stands and his death overs economy rate only bettered by teammate Boult and RCB’s Harshal Patel.
| Bumrah economy in the powerplay | 5.0 |
| Bumrah economy at the death | 7.13 |
| Boult economy at the death | 7.06 |
MI’s champion bowler also has a very favourable record against 2 of the PBKS batsmen. Agarwal has played a couple of great little cameos at the top of the order but has been dismissed 3 times by Bumrah in just 10 balls. MI have tended to hold Bumrah back until the end of the powerplay and then again for 2 overs at the death. Given the fragility of the PBKS batting line-up and the favourable head to head stats, you wonder if they might be inclined to go for the jugular early in this match.
Nicolas Pooran’s current poor run of form is probably 2nd only to the calamitous efforts we saw from Aussie Ashton Turner a couple of seasons ago. 3 ducks in 4 innings puts his place in the side under considerable pressure and we’ll see how long the PBKS hierarchy opt to pin their hopes on the left-hander coming good eventually. Once again Bumrah has a good head to head record agains him having dismissed him twice from just just 8 balls but the West Indian’s forfeit has always been attacking the spinners and in that regard he has a good head to head record against Chahar and Krunal Pandya. Whether he can do that again in these conditions and considering his wretched form remains to be seen…
You may as well copy and paste this next comment into any preview of a PBKS game in IPL 2021 as it goes without saying that the performance of KL Rahul will be crucial to his team’s chances. The PBKS captain has very good head to head stats vs MI and he’ll need to lead from the front again in this fixture.
All IPL player head to head records can be found here
