Admitting that Mumbai Indians would miss its ace seamer Lasith Malinga in the opening tie against Royal Challengers Bangalore as he is suffering from a sour back, skipper Ricky Ponting said the Sri Lankan player would join the team in Mumbai on April 5 and hopefully fit to play soon
“It is disappointing to miss Malinga in the first game. I hope he will be okay after a couple of days and be fit to play for us. We could use Mitchell Johnson, Jacob Oram or Nathan Coulter-Nile in place of Malinga,” the former Aussie skipper said.
Lasith Malinga
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Though Mumbai Indians play their next game against Chennai Super Kings (CSK) at Chennai on April 6, Malinga will not be in the team owing to the ban on Sri Lankan players in all matches hosted in Chennai over the Sri Lankan-Tamils’ issue.
Anyone can join SRT
Asked who would join Sachin Tendulkar in opening the innings, Ponting said though anybody could do so, the team management would decide this evening after assessing the weather, the pitch condition and toss.
“Anybody can open with Sachin depending upon weather and pitch conditions. We could end up playing a shorter game as it has been raining here during the past days, but not today. Keeping this in mind, we will decide on the opening combination before toss,” the skipper observed.
He, however, admitted that in the last couple of seasons, the team had swapped and employing different opening combinations.
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