The opening match of the IPL 2009 will be Chennai Super Kings v Mumbai Indians
One couldn’t have hoped for a bigger cracker of an opening match; what with the runner-up from last season, Chennai Super Kings, taking on a potentially explosive Mumbai Indians outfit. The last season may have seen the Mumbai Indians lose many a match in a row, but that was more to do with the lack of leadership than anything else. This time, Sachin Tendulkar is fit and should lead the team in the entire duration of the tournament.
Tendulkar’s recently found appetite for runs has put him at 22/1 at Paddy Power for being the top-scorer of the tournament and I won’t hesitate in shelling out a few bucks here. With age, Sanath Jayasuriya has turned even wilier and that means that his explosive batting has a new dimension to it. However, between the two, my money will be for the captain, and that is simply because Tendulkar has a penchant to play the big inning. This does not mean that the likes of J.P Duminy, Shikhar Dhawan or Ajinkya Rahane do not merit a mention here; just that it is difficult to visualise them get to the top of the run-scoring chart yet. Duminy has been attractive without scoring a mountain of runs, while Dhawan will first need to find his feet in an away environment – he had played for the Daredevils last year.
The thing about their opponents, the Super Kings, is that they have motley of batsmen who may do well as a team rather than rely on individual batsmen. Still, if I were to pick on a particular batsman, it could very well be a toss-up between Suresh Raina (25/1 Paddy Power) and M.S. Dhoni (33/1 Paddy Power), both of whom have learnt that art of not throwing away their wickets without attaching a premium to it. Amongst the greenhorns, it will be interesting to watch a Murali Vijay bat after his test debut against Australia has spoken a lot about his hard-hitting batting. But whether he will be able to usurp the rest of the batsmen is debateable and so I wouldn’t be betting on him right now.
If Harbhajan Singh learns the art of bowling a little slower than what he does, he could become an able buy, but he has shown a tendency to adopt the role of a restrictive bowler than a wicket-taking one. Same goes with M. Muralitharan on the other side, and with the likes of Makhya Ntini, Andrew Flintoff, Lasith Malinga or Dilhara Fernando not expected to feature in all matches, Zaheer Khan – tipped at a tempting 20/1 by Bluesq – emerges as the front-runner to scalp the most wickets amongst bowlers from between the two sides.
Between the two sides, despite having Tendulkar back at the helm, it will be difficult counting the previous season’s runner-up out, and Chennai (7/9 Betfair) is the favourite to win the match.
My favourite: Chennai Super Kings, 7/9 by Betfair
Best Batsman: Sachin Tendulkar
Best Bowler: Zaheer Khan
