Royal Challengers Bangalore, Warriors Ready for T20 Begins

Bangalore: All is set for the third edition of the Champions League T20 to get under way at the Chinnaswamy Stadium on Friday night.

Never mind if the injury-hit Mumbai Indians no longer look like a Mumbai or Indian outfit, so what if defending champions Chennai Super Kings have a very tired (mentally and physically ) captain leading them out on Saturday a day after Royal Challengers Bangalore field at home at least three foreign players who haven't played a game of cricket for months. This is the World Cup of club cricket and nothing can take that fact away.

With a prize money of $6 million, among the players at least this has become the tournament to qualify for. You could see that in Hyderabad on Wednesday when you could not make out which team had won or lost. For both Somerset and the Kolkata Knight Riders, the entry into the main tournament was what needed to be celebrated.

Talk to players from the teams that have landed in India from around the cricketing world and you will know that the CLT20 has become a must-be-there event in their calendar.

Warriors, the team from Port Elizabeth, South Africa, may be missing Davy Jacobs, their captain of last year when the Warriors made the CLT20 final, but they have enough talent in the squad to go all the way.

As many as three spinners, all of whom can bat, a couple of decent fast men and a host of young batsmen who can hit the ball hard makes them a side to watch out for.

Led by Johan Botha, the South African T20 skipper, they have the experience of Mark Boucher and Ashwell Prince to boost their batting. In Colin Ingram, Craig Thyssen and Jon Jon Smuts, who is likely to open the batting with Prince, they have the requisite youth power for this format.

Where the Warriors may feel the pinch is in their relatively inexperienced pace attack. The tall Lonwabo Tsotsobe leads the attack and it will be upto him to raise the bar.

On Indian tracks though, Botha's offbreak , Nicky Boje's left-arm spin and Smuts' similar stuff can make up for anything the faster men struggle with. They will have to deal with the weight of expectations though. An unknown quantity last year, they are aware that their opponents will be better prepared for them this time around. They will also have to prove that they are good travelers.

Teams from

Royal Challengers Bangalore DL Vettori (capt), MA Agarwal, S Aravind, KB Arun Karthik, RR Bhatkal, AB de Villiers (wk), TM Dilshan, CH Gayle, M Kaif, V Kohli, A Mithun, DP Nannes, AUK Pathan, J Syed Mohammad, SS Tiwary

Warriors J Botha (capt), ACR Birch, N Boje, MV Boucher (wk), CA Ingram, JP Kreusch, L Meyer, M Ntini, WD Parnell, AG Prince, JT Smuts, KR Smuts, J Theron, CA Thyssen, LL Tsotsobe

Stats and trivia

• Warriors made only one of the 16 highest totals in the Pro20 this season
• With 70 sixes, Gayle is fourth on the list of most sixes hit in the IPL, though he has played less than half the number of matches of the top three
• Bangalore will become the only team to have played all three seasons of the Champions League

Match facts
Friday September 23, 2011 (day/night)
Start time 2000 local (1430 GMT)