Two of the most successful franchises in the Indian Premier League (IPL) history, the defending champions Chennai Super Kings (CSK) and five-time title holders Mumbai Indians (MI) suffered an early ouster from the 15th season of the cash-rich league. Who would have imagined the IPL two giants will be fighting to evade the wooden spoon, which is the no.10 position in the points table at the end of the tournament?
So far in the tournament, 68 matches have been played and MS Dhoni's CSK and MI are occupying the bottom two spots in the IPL 2022 points table with Rohit Sharma-led side still has a game to play. Currently CSK are stationed at ninth spot with four victories and 10 defeats out of 14 matches, while MI are last in the IPL standings with mere three wins and ten losses in a total of 14 matches.
However on Friday's night, Ravichandran Ashwin, once again, proved his utility with the bat when his team needed it the most as Rajasthan Royals (RR) defeated CSK by five wickets to finish the IPL league phase in Top-2. And now the ball is in MI's court as they have a match in hand and will be playing their last game against the IPL playoffs' hopefuls Delhi Capitals on Saturday with an intention to end the tournament on a winning note. Not only do Mi need two results to go their way, but they also need the results by significant margins as well. In their own game against DC, MI will require a victory of more than 50 runs or they will have to chase the target down with 5 or 6 overs in hand, that is by the 14th or the 15th over of the innings, if they bat second.
If the results go the way MI want, it will also ensure the no. of points acquired by both CSK and MI is equal and since MI’s NRR will be better in that scenario, they will move to the 9th position in the table. But, it is very, very unlikely for both these results to go MI’s way by as much of a margin as they need to finish ninth on the points table.
