Table toppers Chennai Super Kings shall lock horns with Rajasthan Royals in Match 25 of the Indian Premier League later on Thursday evening at the Sawai Man Singh Stadium in Jaipur.

CSK are comfortably placed at the top of the table with five wins from their six matches, while the Rajasthan Royals are languishing closer to the bottom of the table. The Royals who just have one win from their five matches, are in desperate need to turn around their season.

In their most recent clash against Kolkata Knight Riders at home, the Royals batsmen struggled with the pace of the wicket and could only manage 139-3, which the visitors chased down  comfortably in 13.5 overs.

The Royals have major headaches to take care of in their batting department which has been rather lackluster in the middle order. Skipper Ajinkya Rahane was expected to be the lynch-pin of the team’s batting, but he has managed to score just 124 runs in five innings. Much to their bad luck, Sanju Samson, who scored the first hundred of the season, has missed the last couple of matches because of injury.

English all-rounder Ben Stokes has had a disappointing season with both bat and ball. Jos Buttler and Steve Smith are Rajasthan Royals’ two top run-getters this season. Buttler has had three good outings this season, while Smith’s scores have made improvement with every innings gone by.

On the bowling front, the leg-spinner Shreyas Gopal has consistently been among the top wicket-takers this season, but hasnt got support from the rest. The Rajasthan Royals’ pace bowling attack has been a tad too expensive, as even someone as experienced as Stokes has been taken for 10.84 runs per over, while the new ball seamer Dhawal Kulkarni has conceded runs at 9.65 rpo.

The Chennai Super Kings have raced away to ten points on the board despite not being in their all conquering mode . The Super Kings’ have some issues with the poor form exhibited by Suresh Raina and Ambati Rayudu’s batting form. MS Dhoni and co. have excelled playing at home – even if the conditions haven’t been to their complete liking; they now face the challenge of having to adapt – team combination-wise and strategy-wise – to the different conditions they will find on the road.

Dew will once again play  be a huge factor, and therefore the impact rendered by the spinners in both the sides could have a significant  bearing on the  result match. Harbhajan Singh, despite bowling beautifully in the previous match, could make way for a third quick, while given CSK’s perceived weakness against spin, Shreyas Gopal will look to add to his tally.

Previous Match XIs:

Rajasthan Royals:Ajinkya Rahane, Jos Buttler, Steve Smith, Rahul Tripathi, Ben Stokes, Prashant Chopra, K Gowtham, Shreyas Gopal, Jofra Archer, S Midhun, Dhawal Kulkarni.

Chennai Super Kings:Shane Watson, Faf du Plessis, Suresh Raina, Ambati Rayudu, Kedar Jadhav, MS Dhoni, Ravindra Jadeja, Scott Kuggeleijn, Harbhajan Singh, Deepak Chahar, Imran Tahir.