Ranji Trophy: Depleted Mumbai take on Punjab in final league tie

A depleted Mumbai outfit sans key batsmen Ajinkya Rahane, Rohit Sharma and Abhishek Nayar, and front-liner pacers Zaheer Khan and Dhawal Kulkarni, will take on Punjab in their last Ranji Trophy Elite Division Group A match here from tomorrow.

Although without their regular players with Rahane, Rohit and Zaheer in Australia with the national team and Nayar out with injury while Kulkarni resting, Mumbai are facing no anxiety as they have already booked their quarter-final spot in the tournament.

The visitors, on the other hand, are in spot of bother to book the last available berth from the group.

Group leaders Karnataka (21 points), followed by Mumbai (20 points) are already in the last eight stage.

Meanwhile, Punjab who are also without their key players -- Harbhajan Singh and Yuvraj Singh -- have to put their best foot forward at the Wankhede Stadium here to score an outright victory over Mumbai.

But picking up five points against even a depleted Mumbai at their backyard is not going to be easy for the Uday Kaul-led Punjab, who currently have 15 points and are lying at third position in the group table.

Six teams -- three each from the two Elite divisions --and the two finalists from the Plate group, would qualify for the quarterfinals.

If Punjab fail in their bid for an outfight victory, they can still make it, but it will depend on the other results in the group in which Railways (13), Saurashtra (11) and last year's champions Rajasthan (10) are still in with a chance to make it to the last eight.

Punjab's bowling has been bolstered by the availability of lanky, unorthodox leg-break bowler Rahul Sharma whose confidence must be quite high after a good outing in his debut ODI against the West Indies at Indore where he took three wickets in his first three overs and in the previous game against Karnataka, in which he finished with four wickets.