The highly-anticipated day has arrived as the 12th edition of Indian Premier League will kickstart today (Saturday) with two heavyweights Virat Kohli's Royal Challengers Bangalore and Mahendra Singh Dhoni's Chennai Super Kings clashing at MA Chidambaram Stadium. With the two biggest names of Indian cricket involved, the clash itself gets the blockbuster tag before the very first ball of the tournament.
In the 2018 edition, Chennai Super Kings had an upper hand over Royal Challengers Bangalore, but this time Kohli's army has an opportunity to get the edge over them and start the tournament on the winning note.
RCB have recruited some big names this year with Marcus Stoinis and Shimron Hetmyer to name a few. Stoinis will not participate in the opening clash he is with his national team who are facing Pakistan in the ODI series in UAE.
While CSK have lost their young pacer Lungi Ngidi, courtesy injury, which ruled him out for this season of the IPL, like past seasons the defending champions are very well balanced this season too.
What to expect:
It will be a cracker of a contest when Virat Kohli's army collide with MS Dhoni's gang at full-packed MA Chidambaram stadium. Defending champions CSK will surely be entered the match as favourites but it's the season opener so anything can happen in the clash. It will be 60-40 in CSK favour, but RCB have the firepower in Kohli and AB de Villiers which can change the fortune for them.
Predicted Playing XIs of CSK and RCB:
RCB - Parthiv Patel(wk), Virat Kohli(c), AB de Villiers, Shivam Dubey, Shimron Hetmyer, Moeen Ali, Washington Sundar, Tim Southee, Yuzvendra Chahal, Umesh Yadav and Mohammad Siraj.
CSK - Shane Watson, Ambati Rayudu, Faf du Plessis, Suresh Raina, MS Dhoni (wk and c), Kedar Jadhav, Dwayne Bravo, Ravindra Jadeja, Deepak Chahar, Mohit Sharma, Karn Sharma/ Harbhajan Singh
