"In the last 2 innings, it seemed like he was going too hard too soon" - Aakash Chopra on Riyan Parag ahead of Rajasthan Royals' IPL 2024 clash vs MI

Heading into the Rajasthan Royals' (RR) IPL 2024 clash against the Mumbai Indians (MI), Aakash Chopra reckons RR batter Riyan Parag was a little hasty in his last two innings

RR and MI will square off at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur on Monday, April 22. With 12 points from seven games, the Royals are perched atop the points table and a win against MI will take them a step closer to the playoffs.

In a video shared on his YouTube channel, Chopra chose Parag as one of the Rajasthan Royals' players to watch out for in Monday's game.

"For this game, I am going with Riyan Parag because he scored a fifty in the last match (against MI). He batted extremely well. He hit a six over cover off Gerald Coetzee's bowling. He played a pull shot as well and a six off Piyush Chawla's bowling," he reasoned (11:00).

"Riyan's form is very good. When someone is playing well, you should focus on the kid that how he plays this time. Although he was batting well, in the last two innings, it seemed like he was going too hard too soon," the former India opener added.

Parag has smashed 318 runs at an excellent strike rate of 161.42 in seven innings in IPL 2024. Although the Assam player scored 23 and 34 runs respectively in his last two innings, he couldn't convert them into more substantial contributions.

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"The bat is striking the ball well now but he is trying to murder the ball" - Aakash Chopra on Rajasthan Royals' Yashasvi Jaiswal

Yashasvi Jaiswal scored a nine-ball 19 in RR's previous game against KKR. [P/C: iplt20.com]

Aakash Chopra picked Yashasvi Jaiswal as another Rajasthan Royals batter in focus against the Mumbai Indians.

"I am once again going with Yashasvi. Even if we see the last match, he was batting well. The bat is striking the ball well now but he is trying to murder the ball, that he would hit so hard that the ball breaks into two pieces. You don't have to break the ball into pieces," he said (10:20).

"The second reason is that not much might has been seen in Mumbai's bowling. If you play Mumbai's bowling properly for a little while, you can score big runs. We have seen that repeatedly. You have to survive against Jasprit Bumrah a little but he will bowl only one over at the start," the renowned commentator added.

Chopra named Yuzvendra Chahal as the Rajasthan Royals spinner he is keen to watch in Monday's game.

"The third player to watch out for - I am going with Yuzi Chahal because he picked up three wickets when they played against each other last time. The ground here is very big in any case, so since Yuzi Chahal is very clever, he bowls far and fast to the left-handers, and far and slow to right-handers. So he has a different method of doing things," he explained (11:55).

Chahal is RR's highest wicket-taker this season. The leg-spinner has accounted for 12 dismissals in seven games at an acceptable economy rate of 8.34.