Defending champions Karachi Kings will restart their Pakistan Super League (PSL) season six campaign against Multan Sultans today at the Sheikh Zayed Stadium in Abu Dhabi.
The contest will be the first match of a double-header on Thursday, scheduled to start at 6.00 pm (PST).
Karachi Kings started the title defence successfully in Karachi. They played five matches and won three of them. They are second on the points table with run-rate of 0.697.
Read: Babar Azam leads Karachi Kings to second win in PSL 6
In their last match of PSL 2021, before the T20 league was halted, Karachi Kings hammered Peshawar Zalmi by six wickets. Set to chase 189, they were guided home by Babar Azam, who scored an unbeaten 77 off 47 balls.
On the other hand, Multan Sultans had a poor run. They won only one out of their five matches and are struggling at the fifth position in the points table.
They lost their last two matches in the competition to Karachi Kings (seven wickets) and Quetta Gladiators (22 runs). Skipper Mohammad Rizwan scored an impressive half-century against the Gladiators, but could not find any support from the rest of the batting order.
Players to watch out for:
Pakistan’s opening pair of Mohammad Rizwan and Babar Azam will come head to head today. Both of them have been at their prime form in the T20s.
Rizwan has been exceptional for Pakistan and he has performed brilliantly for the Sultans as well. In fact, in the PSL 2021, he is the leading run-scorer with 297 runs from five games at an average and strike-rate of 59.40 and 140.09 respectively.
Meanwhile, Babar is the second-highest run-getter with 258 runs at a strike rate of 138.7.
Among bowlers, Kings will rely on Mohammad Amir, who has the potential to rip through the best of batting line-ups. He has picked up four wickets from five games and has been economical.
Sultans’ emerging star, Shahnawaz Dahani will be key for the energy he brings into the game. He has nine wickets in four matches to his name but needs support from his fellow bowlers.
Predicted XIs:
Multan Sultans: Mohammad Rizwan, Johnson Charles, Shimron Hetmyer, Rilee Rossouw, Sohaib Maqsood, Khushdil Shah, Sohail Khan, Sohail Tanvir, Shahnawaz Dhani, Usman Qadir, Imran Tahir
Karachi Kings: Sharjeel Khan, Babar Azam, Martin Guptill, Chadwick Walton, Danish Aziz, Thisara Perera, Imad Wasim, Qasim Akram, Mohammad Amir, Arshad Iqbal, Waqas Maqsood
