Punjab Seek Victory Against Bangalore

Chandigarh: Kings XI Punjab will look forward to home advantage to put it across the Royal Challengers Bangalore, when the two sides face each other at the PCA stadium on Monday.

To be fair to the Punjab team, they have been more on the road this season, playing seven of their 10 games away. It is in stark contrast to the other teams - Royal Challengers Bangalore, Rajasthan Royals, Sunrisers Hyderabad and Chennai Super Kings - who turned their respective grounds into impregnable fortresses this season.

In contrast, Punjab have played only three matches at home and won two of those, their only loss coming at the hands of Chennai Super Kings. However, three consecutive away losses (to the Kolkata Knight Riders, Mumbai Indians and Chennai Super Kings) have nearly put Kings XI Punjab out of the semifinals race.

Once again the Punjab team will depend on their foreign recruits - David Miller, Shaun Marsh and David Hussey - to bail them out of a potential difficult spot.

On otherhand, RCB, a batting order which starts with the stormy Chris Gayle, flourishes on the back of a consistent Virat Kohli and ends with AB De Villiers' innovation. Royal Challengers, meanwhile, will look to continue what they started in their last match against Pune Warriors - set their rather unsatisfactory away record straight.

In bowling, Vinay Kumar and RP Singh have taken up the challenge to bail their team out of a tight spot, time and again.

Going by the trends this season, Punjab will have high hopes of winning a home match; however, the Royal Challengers is keen on spoiling the party for the home team.

Teams:

Kings XI Punjab: Adam Gilchrist (captain & wk), Azhar Mahmood, Bhargav Bhatt, Bipul Sharma, David Hussey, David Miller, Dimitri Mascarenhas, Gurkeerat Singh (wk), Harmeet Singh, Mandeep Singh, Nitin Saini, Parvinder Awana, Paul Valthaty, Piyush Chawla, Praveen Kumar, Rajagopal Sathish, Ryan Harris, Siddharth Chitnis, Sunny Singh, Shaun Marsh, Manan Vohra, Luke Pomersbach, Manpreet Gony, Sandeep Sharma, Aniket Choudhary

Royal Challengers Bangalore: Virat Kohli (captain), Arun Karthik (wk), AB de Villiers (wk), Abhimanyu Mithun, Abhinav Mukund, Andrew McDonald, Chris Gayle, Harshal Patel, KP Appanna, Karun Nair, Mayank Agarwal, Muttiah Muralitharan, Prasanth Parameswaran, Vinay Kumar, Sandeep Warrier, Saurabh Tiwary, Cheteshwar Pujara, Sunny Sohal, Syed Mohammad Jamaluddin, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Vijay Zol, Zaheer Khan, RP Singh, Daniel Christian, Moises Henriques, Ravi Rampaul, Pankaj Singh, Jaidev Unadkat, Christopher Barnwell, Murali Kartik, Sheldon Jackson, Lokesh Rahul

Match facts
Monday May 6, 2013 (day/night)
Start time 20:00 local (1430 GMT)