Pune Warriors will have a chance to avenge Monday's loss to Chennai Super Kings when the two sides meet for the return leg on Wednesday.
Visitors Pune restricted Chennai to 142 on Monday but some accurate bowling and excellent fielding and catching saw the hosts emerge victorious by 17 runs.
The Yuvraj Singh-led side won its first two games but is now on a three-match losing streak and must get full points in Navi Mumbai to get their campaign back on track.
Pune have been well served by opener Jesse Ryder and Yuvraj but the other batsmen have failed to deliver.
Robin Uthappa is the only other batsman to score more than 100 runs but he too has not played as responsibly as he needs to.
With Pune's batting not in great form, Chennai will be once again looking to their bowlers to keep the hosts in check, just like they did at home on Monday.
Chennai have pacers Doug Bollinger and Albie Morkel in good form and the two off spinners, Suraj Randeev and R Ashwin, have been instrumental in the team's wins so far.
Pune will do well to shuffle their batting around to counter the Chennai bowling.
Manish Pandey, the first Indian to score an IPL century, looked good in his brief stay on his return to the side after serving a four-match ban for trying to negotiate a better monetary deal for himself. Pune must look to bat him at the top of the order.
Pandey has all the shots in the book, is aggressive and will be a good foil to the left-handed Ryder. Yuvraj too needs to come up the order at number three so he faces as many deliveries as possible.
Uthappa has timed the ball well but his shot selection has been poor and he will do well to learn from his mistakes. He can be the ideal finisher for Pune if he manages to stay till the end, with Nathan mcCullum and Mohnish Mishra capable of clearing the boundary.
Mithun Manhas may not be as aggressive as expected in the IPL but he can be the perfect anchor for big hitters like Yuvraj and Uthappa provided he is not batting lower down the order where he will have to try and clear the fence every ball.
Pune must also look to bat first as their bowling unit has been the best in the IPL so far. None of the bowlers averages more than eight runs an over and the likes of Alfonso Thomas, Murali Kartik and Rahul Sharma have picked up wickets consistently as well.
Chennai will have to make special plans for the Pune bowlers and will hope Murali Vijay, who could be out with a hamstring niggle, is fit to open the batting with Michael Hussey.
Chennai's middle order has not done well and the team will be looking towards Suresh Raina and MS Dhoni to deliver the goods.
On paper, the match is an even contest with individual brilliance likely to hand one team maximum points.