Ranji Trophy: Ishant Sharma will be itching to fire

Traditional rivals Mumbai and Delhi will fight tooth and nail to get closer to the ultimate Ranji Trophy honours in their semi-final clash at the Brabourne Stadium today

Traditional rivals Mumbai and Delhi will fight tooth and nail to get closer to the ultimate Ranji Trophy honours in their semi-final clash at the Brabourne Stadium today. Mumbai enjoy a huge home advantage, but Delhi have the ammunition to deflate the confidence of the hosts.

Ishant sweats it out at the Brabourne nets on Saturday

Although the Mumbai camp will try their best to negate the Ishant Sharma factor, the fact is that the lanky India fast bowler, who did not make it in the tri-series squad to Bangladesh, is too good not to be a threat to Mumbai's ambition.

Ishant may not be in the best of rhythm, but fast bowlers have that knack of coming good without too much of a lead-up. To Ishant's advantage, he can think out top quality batsmen. Hence, skipper Wasim Jaffer and his fellow batters must be on top of their game. The hunger factor too is critical. After all, Ishant was in the reserves during the Brabourne Test against Sri Lanka. The man loves his sleep and he was captured by this paper's photographer napping on one of the Test match days. Doubtless, today he will be wide awake and kicking.