Reigning champions Mumbai will take on Punjab in the Ranji quarter-final at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai starting tomorrow. The Mumbai team will be led by Amol Muzumdar in the absence of Sameer Dighe who is on Test duty. The side will also miss badly the services of its star performers - batting maestro Sachin Tendulkar, leg spinner Sairaj Bahutule and left arm spinner Nilesh Kulkarni. All rounder Ajit Agarkar will also miss out the game following a viral attack.

With the top players unavailable, Mumbai will look forward to the experience of Wasim Jaffer and Tendulkar clone Vinayak Mane to give a sound start. Mane especially was in fine nick against the England under-19 side last month and also impressed the Australian seamer Glenn McGrath. The Aussie had a special word of praise for the youngster during the visitors' tour game against the last year's Ranji Trophy champions.

The middle order will be manned by Test discard Vinod Kambli, Jatin Paranjpe and Muzumdar who will have to produce something special against the Punjab attack. Kambli has been in fine form having made 345 runs at an impressive average of 115 with a highest of 203 not out. Muzumdar has not had a good season so far having scored just 187 runs at an average of 37.40 with 81 as his highest. He needs to produce something extraordinary to see his side through to the next stage, while openers Wasim Jaffer and Mane have had a mixed season. Jaffer has made 240 runs while Mane has totalled 204. Both of them are yet to score a century this year and this may well be the right occasion to strike it rich.

Mumbai will depend heavily on the experience of seamer Paras Mhambhrey, off spinner Ramesh Powar and left-arm spinner Rajesh Pawar to do the trick while the final spot will be a toss up between all rounder Robin Morris and paceman Santhosh Saxena.

Punjab, led by former Test opener Vikram Rathour, have a strong line-up. They have some exciting strikers in the form of opener Ravneet Ricky, Pankaj Dharmani and the exciting striker Yuvraj Singh. They also have under-19 star RS Sodhi who has been in fine nick this season. The three players - Rathour, Dharmani and Sodhi have been in prime form in this edition of the tournament. Dharmani made a century in the pre-quarterfinal against Rajasthan. In the league games, Dharmani has made 447 runs at an average of over 74.50 with two hundreds and a fifty. Sodhi has made 272 runs at an average of 68.00 and Rathour has made 358 at 59.66. Punjab will sorely miss the services of triple centurion Dinesh Mongia who has made 368 runs at an average of 73.60 as he will join the Indian team to play the charity match

Gagandeep Singh, Reetinder Sodhi and Vineet Sharma will have to produce their best against strong Mumbai line-up as they will be missing the services of leading wicket taker Harbhajan Singh who is donning national colours. Punjab may heave a sigh of relief as the BCCI secretary, Jaywant Lele, told PTI in Mumbai over phone from Baroda that BCCI had agreed to relieve Indian off spinner Sarandeep Singh, after the Punjab team management had requested it to do so. Lele said "The off-spinner can assist his state team in the quarter-finals instead of being in the reserves at Chennai." Lele added.

Their two spinners Sandeep Sanwal and Babloo Kumar bowled very well in the pre-quarter final against Rajasthan. Gagandeep Singh has taken 22 wickets, while Sodhi has eight.

The teams (Mumbai): Amol Muzumdar (capt), Wasim Jaffer, Vinayak Mane, Jatin Paranjpe, Vinod Kambli, Robin Morris, Kunal More, Ramesh Powar, Paras Mhambrey, Santosh Saxena, Sriram Kannan, Vishal Tawde, Rajesh Pawar, Amit Dani and Amol Rane (wicketkeeper). Coach: Ashok Mankad.

Punjab: Vikram Rathour (capt-wicketkeeper), Ravneet Ricky, Yuvraj Singh, Pankaj Dharmani, Manish Sharma, Sarandeep Singh, Sundeep Sanwal, Babloo Kumar, Vineet Sharma, Gagandeep Singh, RS Sodhi, Sandeep Sharma, Sanjay Dhull, Ankur Kakkar and Harminder Jugnu.

Umpires: I Sivaram (Hyderabad) and GA Pratap Kumar (TN). Match referee: Harish Joshi.

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