New Delhi, 14 March

Defending champions Mumbai Indians will look to their captain Harmanpreet Kaur for inspiration when they take on a plucky Royal Challengers Bangalore in the Women's Premier League Eliminator here on Friday.

Mumbai head to the match on the back of five wins and three losses including the seven-wicket loss RCB inflicted on them earlier this week. However, the holders are counting it as a rare off day.

"I have seen consistency. If we make an exception for the last match, all the other games that we won. Yes. the performance was not good in the last match, but that's okay. We are prepared for the next game. And this happened before the Eliminators so we are taking this as a good sign," MI batting coach Devika Palshikaar said on the eve of the game.

Last year, UP Warriorz dented MI's playoff chances by defeating them in the league stage. Harmanpreet and Co then went on to win a one-sided Eliminator before claiming the title. "Don't you think that history is repeating. We went through this last year as well, just before the Eliminators there were little ups and downs, but we bounced back in the Eliminator and played one-sided against them. So, we are taking this as a 'good luck' sign hoping that we are going to repeat the same history this year with the same results as last year," Palshikaar added.

Harmanpreet bailed MI out with a whirlwind 95 not out against Gujarat Giants and the skipper will be key with the bat come Friday.

RCB have improved vastly from last year but Smriti Mandhana and Co. have qualified for their maiden knockouts on the back of an inconsistent run. They have won four games and lost four.  

The positives for RCB include Mandhana returning to form, and the big-hitting Richa Ghosh and all-rounder Ellyse Perry being among runs.

The bowling unit comprising Sophie Devine, Sophie Molineux, Asha Sobhana, Shreyanka Patil and Perry have also done reasonably well but will have to be razor sharp againt MI. "We’re really excited to qualify for the playoffs. To be able to do that, we’ve needed different contributors at different times. Except, we haven’t been anywhere near perfect,” RCB head coach Luke Williams said.

“We’ve had performances we thought we can improve on. We’re primed to play some good cricket hopefully on Friday and if we’re good enough on Sunday as well,” he added.

MI enjoy a 3-1 head to head against RCB. The winner of the clash will take on Delhi Capitals in the final on Sunday.

Match starts 7:30pm IST.