Virat Kohli and ABD celebrating Picture Credit: BCCI/IPL
Mumbai Indians and Royal Challengers Bangalore will be playing the inaugural match of IPL 2021 at the MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai. MI has a very good record at the Chennai venue but despite that fact, the only time MI and RCB played in Chennai was in 2011 IPL Qualifier-2 and RCB ended up winning that match.
It will be interesting to see who comes out on top as MI has a good record in Chennai and Virat Kohli's revamped side will be looking start this new IPL season with a bang.
Head-to-Head overall
P - 27; MI - 17; RCB -10
Virat Kohli as captain vs MI
P - 18; W - 6; L -12
Rohit Sharma as captain vs RCB
P - 14; W - 10; L -4
Let us have a look at some of the interesting numbers before the 1st match of the IPL:
Most runs for MI vs RCB - K.Pollard (537)
Most runs for RCB vs MI - V.Kohli(637)
Most wickets for MI vs RCB - J.Bumrah(19)
Most wickets for RCB vs MI - Y.Chahal(19)
5 - Since 2012, MI have played 5 matches at Chepauk, MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai and have won all the matches they played.
100 - Yuzvendra Chahal will be playing his 100th match in IPL [99th match for RCB]. Also Chahal will play his 200th T20 match.
71 - If Rohit Sharma wins the 1st match, then he will join Gautam Gambhir with 71 wins as captain in IPL.
Most wins as captain in IPL
MS Dhoni - 110
Gautam Gambhir - 71
Rohit Sharma - 70*
0 - Since 2013 Mumbai Indians have not won the 1st match in IPL and Virat Kohli as captain hasn't won a single match as captain at Chepauk, MA Chidambaram Stadium in Chennai.
200 - RCB is the only team to have two players having 200+ S.R in death overs (17-20), AB de Villiers (233.09) & V.Kohli (205.52). These two players will again be expected to provide fireworks at the death.
1500 - SuryaKumar needs 84 more runs to become the 5th player to score 1500 runs for MI alone.
217 - Rohit Sharma has smashed 213 sixes in IPL so far and he is only behind MS Dhoni (216) among Indian players. Rohit needs 4 more sixes against RCB to have most sixes in IPL for an Indian player
50 - Navdeep Saini needs 1 more wicket to pick 50 T20 wickets.