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Both teams have 4/7 records so far this season
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57% of teams chasing win at Mohali
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Arshdeep Singh has 13 wickets in 7 matches this season
Friday April 28, 15:00
TV: Live on Sky Sports
Punjab Team News
Punjab are on eight points, courtesy of four wins and three losses from their seven games so far.
They secured a vital win last time out that not only gave them three points but stopped Mumbai in their tracks.
Man-of-the-match Sam Curran, standing in for the injured Shikhar Dhawan played his first really meaningful innings of the season with a boundary-filled 55 off 29 from number six. Harpreet Singh made an important 41 off 28 and Jitesh Sharma carried on his good form with 25 of just seven, a huge knock in the context of the match.
But save a thought for Arshdeep Singh, who took four wickets and (easily) defended 16 off the last over; he took two wickets in it and conceded just two runs. Surely he should have been MOM?
Dhawan looks like he's finally recovered from injury so should open and lead the side.
Possible XI Dhawan, Singh, Short, Livingstone, H Singh, Curran, Sharma, Shahrukh Khan, Brar, Arshdeep, Brar, Ellis.
LSG Team news
Lucknow are in the same position as Punjab with four wins and three losses.
Last time out they failed to chase just 135/6 against Gujarat, a worrying loss.
Yes, if you had to pick one side to defend that in the whole of the IPL, it would be the Titans. And yes it was a tricky pitch.
But considering they actually made a good start with openers KL Rahul and Kyle Mayers scoring 68 and 24, respectively and you can see just how criminal it was that they didn't get over the line.
Nicholas Pooran, Ayush Badoni, Marcus Stoinis and Deepak Hooda were all guilty of either playing poor shots or getting mindlessly run out (Hooda/Badoni). Credit to Mohit Sharma, who like Arshdeep, bowled a superb final over. But the fact LSG traded at 1.01 tells you all you need to know.
The points lost are bad enough but let's see if they mentally recover from that farce.
Possible XIRahul, Mayers, Hooda, Krunal, Stoinis, Pooran, Badoni, Mankad, Bishnoi, Khan, Ul Haq
Pitch report
191/5, 153/8, 174/4. Those were the first innings scores at Mohali so far this season. The 153/8 was easily chased by Gujarat, the two others were winning first innings scores.
The long-term stats across 58 IPL matches here show that the average first innings score is 165 with a bias for the chaser, who won 33/58 (57%).
So it will be interesting to see what the skipper winning the toss decides to do.
How to play
LSG are very, very slight outsiders at 2.0421/20 and that looks about right: it's hard to split the pair.
They're on the same number of points and they each won one of the two games they played against each other last season.
They look pretty well-matched in terms of personnel and perhaps the only factor that might sway things towards Punjab is that they're coming into this one fresh from a good win while LSG arrive here on the back of a shocking loss.
If Punjab bat first, get to 170 or more and are close to even money at the change of innings, they could be a bet because their death bowling looks good and because of how LSG blew the chase last time.
But it's still a tough match to call so it may be best to leave the winner market alone.
Arshdeep head and shoulders above the rest
Arshdeep Singh showed last time out what a fabulous death bowler he is. Those four wickets in the match have taken him up to 13 wickets for the season at a strike rate of 11.53, which is superb.
That's six wickets more than the next best - Nathan Ellis, who admittedly played two fewer games- whilst no-one else has more than five.
So, the 11/4 on a player who has almost double the wickets of anyone else in the side has to be snapped up, especially as we know he's guaranteed to bowl at the death.
Overpriced Stoinis
It's been an up and down season for Marcus Stoinis. There have been moments of brilliance such as the 65 off 30 against RCB and a few moments of pretty average shot selection and execution. Last time he was out for a golden duck trying to hit his first ball for six.
But here's what we do know.
That 65 was enough for him to have won the top batsman market once this season already and though LSG have a very fluid batting line-up, he's most likely to bat at four or five most of the time.
A concern here is that the Mayers/ Rahul partnership bat deep and don't give anyone else much of a chance. But then again, you can't have it all our own way on 9/1 shot and he's certainly good enough to not be that price.