RAJ vs PJB MPL Team: Rajasthan Royals takes on Kings XI Punjab in their second league game at Sharjah. Both teams are coming off a victory and their batsman would be raring to go on a flat track with shorter boundaries. With exceptionally talented batsman in both sides, this one should be a bat vs bat contest and the team which bowls decent enough should win.
Rajasthan Royals have first-hand experience of the tracks at Sharjah with them winning their first league match against CSK with Samson and Smith registering fifties each. Buttler who was unavailable for the first match due to quarantine restrictions is back into the squad and will be raring to go. Their fast bowling attack apart from Archer is an issue with them conceding over 200 against CSK.
Kings XI Punjab bounced back strongly from the SuperOver heartbreak against the Royal Challengers Bangalore winning by a big margin of 97 runs. Their captain KL Rahul led from the front with a stupendous 132* off 69 balls and the conditions at Sharjah might help him repeat that performance once again.

RAJ vs PJB MPL Prediction

Fixture: Rajasthan Royals vs Kings XI Punjab, Match 9, IPL 2020
Date & Time: Sunday, 27th September 2020 at 7:30 pm (IST)
Venue: Sharjah Cricket Stadium, Sharjah
Venue Stats: The average first innings score at Sharjah in T20s is 161. Teams have won 26 times chasing and 20 times batting first on this venue. The ground dimensions are a bit small with a 73m straight boundary and 60m square boundaries.
Pitch Report: A flat track with lack of seam movement for the pacers and lack of turn for the spinners. Low bounce is a factor at this venue. Dew is expected in the second innings with humidity levels at 63%.

RAJ vs PJB MPL Team, Playing XIs, Mega Contest

Team news: Buttler will start this match for Rajasthan Royals and as a result, A Rajpoot/K Tyagi will replace T Curran with the former most likely to start. S Smith indicated of playing Buttler as a finisher but considering Buttler’s records at the top, he will partner S Smith at the top against Kings XI Punjab.

KXIP dropped Jordan and Gowtham to bring in Neesham and M Ashwin to exploit the matchups against RCB. They’re more likely to go with the same eleven that played against RCB.

Expected changes: Buttler in for Jaiswal and Rajpoot replaces T Curran.

Mostly an unchanged side, but there’s a slight possibility of bringing in J Suchith the left-arm spinner as a matchup against the right-hand heavy RR top-order.

Underperformers/risky picks: D Miller has a lot of limitations against spin bowlers and it’ll be tough for him to counter the two leg-spinners in KXIP.

J Unadkat has been one of the worst bowlers in the past two years of IPL history. The short boundaries and the flat decks at Sharjah don’t help him either. The predicted XIs for the RAJ vs PJB MPL fantasy cricket tips are as follows:

RAJ Playing XI (predicted):
J Buttler
S Smith (C)
S Samson (WK)
R Uthappa
D Miller
R Parag
R Tewatia
S Gopal
J Archer
J Unadkat
A Rajpoot

PJB Playing XI (predicted):
KL Rahul (C & WK)
M Agarwal
K Nair
N Pooran
G Maxwell
Sarfaraz Khan
J Neesham
M Ashwin
S Cottrel
M Shami
R Bishnoi

RAJ vs PJB MPL Fantasy Cricket Tips 

Captain Choices-

J Buttler – He was in good form in the recently concluded T20I series against Australia scoring 121 runs at a strike-rate of 145.78. He would love to bat at Sharjah due to the shorter boundaries in the RAJ vs PJB today’s match prediction.

KL Rahul – He produced a stunning display of batting against RCB in Dubai and he would love the conditions at Sharjah. Gopal and Archer could trouble him a bit but he’s good enough to see them off.

Vice-Captain choices

J Archer – The English pacer is capable of bowling extreme pace and the likes of M Agarwal, Pooran, Maxwell and others will struggle to cope up with it which makes him a prime fantasy option.

R Bishnoi – The ex India Under-19 leg-spinner has made some heads turn towards him after he bagged 4 wickets from his first two games so far. Most RR batsmen are weak against leg-spin and this provides him with an opportunity to add more wickets to his list.

X-Factors

R Uthappa – Uthappa didn’t have a great first outing as he was dismissed cheaply against CSK. His prowess against leg-spin is immaculate and with two leggies in M Ashwin and R Bishnoi in the KXIP setup, it could be his day.

G Maxwell – He hasn’t fired with the bat so far and Sharjah provides the apt conditions for his free-flowing batting to flourish. He has the Archer threat going but should be fine considering the short boundaries.

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