Los Angeles Knight Riders vs San Francisco Unicorns Major League Cricket Predictions - Unicorns to half Knight Riders’ late rally

Simon Lewis

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Last updated: 1 hour ago

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Simon Lewis 1 hour ago

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The Unicorns are top of the MLC table after winning four of their last five matches.
The Knight Riders rose from fifth place to third with a second win in three matches.
Four teams are locked on eight points behind the Unicorns on 10 points and all six teams can still qualify for the four playoff spots.

Lhuan-dre Pretorius is the leading run-scorer in the MLC (Getty Images).

Los Angeles Knight Riders vs San Francisco Unicorns Predictions

The Knight Riders look to have turned a corner after losing four matches in fives, winning two of their last three matches. The Unicorns can secure their playoff spot with a win on the back of four wins in five.

Los Angeles Knight Riders’ Colin Munro scored 20, 33, 25 & 55* in his last 5 knocks.
Los Angeles Knight Riders’ Matthew Tromp has scores of 44 & 50 in his last 2 innings.
Los Angeles Knight Riders’ Andre Russell has taken 4/35, 1/22 & 3/34 in 5 matches.
San Francisco Unicorns’ Lhuan-dre Pretorius hit 5 sixes in his 102* vs MI New York.
San Francisco Unicorns’ Matthew Short has scored 34*, 39, 21 & 19* in 4 innings.
San Francisco Unicorns’ Matthew Short has taken 4/17 & 3/24 in his last 2 matches.

Head-to-Head

San Francisco Unicorns have won two and lost two of their last five Major League Cricket matches against the Los Angeles Knight Riders. The Knight Riders have won the last two matches between the two sides, including picking up a seven-wicket win with two balls earlier this season.

Los Angeles Knight Riders Form

The Knight Riders have given themselves a huge boost in the race for the playoffs after halting their mid-season slump by picking up two wins in three matches after beating the Washington Freedom by 18 runs on 9 July.

Colin Munro failed for the first time this season, but Andre Fletcher (59 off 40) and Matthew Tromp (50 off 32) added 110 for the third wicket to set the platform for a score of 192/8 off their 20 overs.

Andre Russell took 3/34 to complete nine wickets in his last five matches as the Freedom were restricted to a score of just 174/8 off their 20 overs. Ali Khan (2/18, econ 4.50) offered superb support, while Shadley van Schalkwyk (2/60) was expensive but picked up two valuable late wickets.

San Francisco Unicorns Form

The Unicorns consolidated their place at the top of the table with an emphatic nine-wicket win over defending champions MI New York, with 26 balls in hand. It was their fourth win in five matches.

Matthew Short knocked over MI New York’s top three batters to reduce them to 82/5. Short returned figures of 3/24 at a rate of just 6.00 runs per over. Haris Rauf (2/24) and Aaron Hardie (2/17) helped to keep MI New York under pressure and restrict them to a score of just 143/9 off their 20 overs.

Lhuan-dre Pretorius scored a magnificent, unbeaten 102 to power his side to their victory score of 146/1 off just 15.4 overs. Pretorius has scored 87, 66 and 102* in his last five innings.

Team news

Both sides are on a good roll of form and are unlikely to fiddle with their lineups as they look to cement their place in the playoffs.

Los Angeles Knight Riders (possible XI): Colin Munro, Andre Fletcher, Unmukt Chand, Rovman Powell, Jason Holder (c), Andre Russell, Saif Badar, Sunil Narine, Shadley van Schalkwyk, Karthik Gattepalli, Carmi le Roux.

San Francisco Unicorns (possible XI): Lhuan-dre Pretorius, Finn Allen, Matthew Short (c), Connor Esterhuizen, Sanjay Krishnamurthi, Hassan Khan, Ravichandran Ashwin, Hammad Azam, Brody Couch, Ghulam Mudassar, Peter Siddle.