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In what has not been an ideal start to the tournament for the defending champions Mumbai Indians, their captain Rohit Sharma had to miss out on the first match of the UAE leg of the competition against Chennai Super Kings on Sunday. The Hitman was not deemed match fit and hence did not come out for the toss. In his absence, vice-captain Kieron Pollard said that Rohit will be back soon and that he was standing in just for the first match.
The news comes as a big setback for the Mumbai team who were hoping for their opener and captain to score big against CSK. To make matters worse for them, even star all-rounder Hardik Pandya has failed to bag a place in the XI presumably due to fitness issues. Consequently, Mumbai Indians have fielded Anmolpreet Singh in their side. Quinton de Kock, Kieron Pollard, Adam Milne and Trent Boult are the four overseas players in this match for the most successful team in IPL history.
In contrast, Chennai Super Kings only had to only deal with the absence of Sam Curran who is still in quarantine. Dwayne Bravo has taken the seam-bowling all-rounder's place in his absence. Meanwhile, Faf du Plessis has recovered from his injury and has straightaway walked into the Chennai XI. Along with Du Plessis and Bravo, Moeen Ali and Josh Hazlewood complete the four foreign players for Chennai Super Kings.
The two teams have already met once in the competition this season and at that time it was a heroic effort from Pollard which had taken the match away from CSK. While Chennai had made 218/4, batting first, thanks to Pollard's unbeaten 87 off 34 balls, MI chased it down in the last ball of the match. While CSK are placed second at the points tally at the moment with five wins from seven matches, MI are placed fourth with four wins.
Here are the Playing XIs of both the teams:
Chennai: Faf du Plessis, Ruturaj Gaikwad, Moeen Ali, Suresh Raina, Ambati Rayudu, Ravindra Jadeja, Dwayne Bravo, MS Dhoni (c & wk), Shardul Thakur, Deepak Chahar, Josh Hazlewood
Mumbai: Quinton de Kock (wk), Suryakumar Yadav, Ishan Kishan, Anmolpreet Singh, Saurabh Tiwary, Kieron Pollard (c), Krunal Pandya, Adam Milne, Rahul Chahar, Jasprit Bumrah, Trent Boult
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