Confident Mumbai take on Railways

The dichotomy — the fast and the furious versus languid elegance — was there for all to see at the Karnail Singh Stadium on Monday,and Amre will be hoping the sounds of bat hitting ball continue to ring out once the real contest begins.

Comfortably placed

While Mumbai are comfortably placed at second in Group A,their top order hasn’t really clicked so far this season and they’ve been bailed out by centuries from Ajit Agarkar and Ramesh Powar against Himachal and Punjab respectively.

“It is great that we have enough depth in the team to take us through to victories. But the top order has to perform.

“Sahil Kukreja,Ajinkya Rahane,Rohit Sharma and Abhishek Nayar have all made half-centuries,but haven’t converted them into big runs. It’s only a matter of time,” Mumbai captain Jaffer told The Indian Express.

“We haven’t decided the team as yet,but I don’t see us making too many changes to the eleven which beat Himachal Pradesh,” Jaffer said,adding that the pitch looked like it would help spinners. “Both Harmeet and Iqbal Abdulla have been bowling well. We expect a result on this pitch.”

Many problems

In stark contrast to Mumbai’s confidence,Murali Kartik’s Railways team have been riddled with problems of late.

With Kulamani Parida’s return still uncertain and Mahesh Rawat dropped due to disciplinary reasons,Railways are lurking second to last at the bottom of the grid. “We’ve been plagued with everything from delayed starts to bad weather. I can understand if we were beaten outright by a better team,but we can’t fight nature,” Kartik said,adding,“We’ve got four matches to go and we hope to turn our fortunes around,if nature permits.”