MATCH PREDICTION: Chennai Smashers look all set to run over Delhi Acers easily

DELHI ACERS TODAY play their second consecutive match in the Babu Banarasi Badminton Stadium during the Lucknow leg of the Premier Badminton League (PBL). They take on the Chennai Smashers who will look to win their second match in a row after beating Mumbai, while the Acers will look to gather themselves and display a better performance than their last night's one against Awadhe Warriors.

The Acers' performance left coach Madhumita Bisht unhappy; she will expect her shuttlers to play well today. Smashers will be high on confidence after their first win, but they need to put up a better singles shuttler in the men's category. In the first match, the Frenchman Brice Leverdez lost to Prannoy (Mumbai) so they should be nominating Sony Dwi Kuncoro instead.

The Acers men's doubles pair put up a great fight last night, but would need to do better in order to win points for their team.

RULES: Each tie comprises of 5 matches -- Men’s Singles, Men’s Doubles, Women’s Singles, Mixed Doubles & Men’s Singles.  Each Match will be played as best-of-three games, with each game being a race to 15 points and a sudden death at 14-14. After each team shares the list of players who will be playing the 5 matches and their choice of Trump match, the order of play will be mutually decided by the technical team of PBL & broadcaster Star India before each tie (from a neutral perspective) to keep the schedule unpredictable.

TRUMP MATCH: Each team strategically selects one of the 5 matches that they play in a Tie as their Trump match. In a Trump match, a victory gives the team a bonus point and a loss gives it a negative point. A team cannot put the same player in the Trump matches proposed by them more than twice in the league stage and once in the knockout stage i.e. if team A places 5 trump matches during the league stage, any player can take part in maximum two of those 5 matches. However, the participation of a player in a Trump match proposed by the opponent will not be counted in this maximum 2 criterion.

For scoring in a Trump match, victory in a normal match gives 1 point, loss carries 0 points. In a Trump match, the team that has called for the Trump gets 2 points for victory and -1 for a loss. However, the other team will play this match as a normal match and will either get 1 or 0 points for win or loss respectively. If both the teams place the Trump on the same match, then for both of them +2 or -1 scoring will apply for win or loss respectively.

TFG analyses and predicts the winner of the match based on a possible line-up of players, as the teams have to announce their team and Trump match only an hour before the game.

CHENNAI SMASHERS vs DELHI ACERS

The following shuttlers are likely to play against each other in their respective categories: Men's singles: Sony Dwi Kuncoro (Chennai) against Ajay Jayaram (Delhi); Men's doubles: Chris Adcock/Pranav Jerry Chopra (Chennai) against Koo Kien Keat/Tan Boon Heong (Delhi); Women's singles: PV Sindhu (Chennai) against PC Thulasi (Delhi); Men's singles: Simon Santoso (Chennai) against Tommy Sugiarto (Delhi); Mixed doubles: Chris Adcock/Pia Zebadiah (Chennai) against Akshay Dewalkar/Gabrielle Adcock (Delhi).

It remains to be seen which matches each team will nominate as their Trump match. Since Sindhu holds the upper hand in the singles tie, it is likely that the Smashers will nominate her match as the Trump. The 20-year-old should win it easily over Acers' shuttler Thulasi.

In the men's singles category, Kuncoro and Ajay are 1-1 in their head-to-head count at the international stage, and it will be interesting to watch how the match pans out. It will take Ajay to put up a superlative performance to stay in the game, though we see the Indonesian taking the match.

Both the men's doubles pairs in today's match have lost their first matches, but the Acers' duo hold the upper hand as they are more experienced. The Acers should be considering this match as their Trump.

The second men's singles match between Simon and Tommy will be an exciting match to witness. Two Indonesians up against each other, the fans couldn't have asked for a better tie. Santoso holds the lead of 3-0 in the head-to-head count and he is likley to win this one too.

The mixed doubles pair of both the teams look strong as they won their first matches. This would be the tie to watch out for as the Adcock couple will be up against each other, both fighting to win points for their team. However, the Smashers pair look more solid and should win this match to round off an easy victory for their team against the Delhi Acers.