MI aim to land the killer punch!

Mumbai Indians will aim to land the killer punch after fluffing an easy runchase in their opener when they meet a dangerous Sunrisers Hyderabad in IPL 2024 on WednesdayFivetime champions MI had a lot going for them in their tournament opener against the Gujarat Titans whether it was the incisive spells from pacer Jasprit Bumrah Dewald Brevis impactful knock or Rohit Sharmas fireworks at the top of the orderBut MI who have built a reputation of slow starters over the years could not manage 48 runs off 36 balls with seven wickets in hand With the 10team event being more competitive than ever before Mumbai cannot afford more such lackadaisical performances going forwardIn his first game as Mumbai captain Hardik pushed himself down the order at number seven to accommodate the likes of Tim David and Brevis higher upConsidering he batted much higher for the Gujarat Titans last year there is a case for him to bat higher up the orderOpener Ishan Kishan back to action after a long break could only last four balls against GT With the T20 World Cup in mind his performances will be tracked closely and have added significance He needs to be at his best with the bat and behind the stumps to make the national squadHardik will also be expecting an improved performance from spinners Shams Mulani and Piyush ChawlaThey face SRH on their home turf and the Pat Cumminsled side showed against Kolkata Knight Riders what they are capable ofThe bighitting Heinrich Klaasen almost got them over the line from a hopeless situation though the rest of the batters put up below par performancesAlso ReadUnder the microscopeThe opening duo of Mayank Agarwal and Abhishek Sharma has shown promise but would also need to be consistent if SRH are to do well in the competitionSRH have invested heavily in pinch hitter Abdul Samad and it is high time he delivers on the promiseThe seasoned Bhuvneshwar Kumar was Andre Russelled on Saturday night and will look to bounce back stronglyTough job in cricket to bowl to someone like him Russell Its one of those ones which goes one way or the other Who would have thought we would have got that close Unfortunately a bit too much Lots to be encouraged by A couple of points to work on also Cummins said after the narrow loss at Eden GardensMI vs SRH IPL 2024 SquadsMumbai Indians Hardik Pandya c Rohit Sharma Dewald Brevis Jasprit Bumrah Piyush Chawla Gerald Coetzee Tim David Shreyas Gopal Ishan Kishan Anshul Kamboj Kumar Kartikeya Akash Madhwal Kwena Maphaka Mohammad Nabi Shams Mulani Naman Dhir Shivalik Sharma Romario Shepherd Arjun Tendulkar Nuwan Thushara Tilak Varma Vishnu Vinod Nehal Wadhera Luke Wood Suryakumar YadavSunrisers Hyderabad Pat Cummins c Abdul Samad Abhishek Sharma Aiden Markram Travis Head Wanindu Hasaranga Marco Jansen Rahul Tripathi Washington Sundar Glenn Phillips Sanvir Singh Heinrich Klaasen Bhuvneshwar Kumar Mayank Agarwal T Natarajan Anmolpreet Singh Mayank Markande Upendra Singh Yadav Umran Malik Nitish Kumar Reddy Fazalhaq Farooqi Shahbaz Ahmed Jaydev Unadkat Akash Singh Jhathavedh SubramanyanWith agency inputs