There has been a strange sort of trend among some teams this IPL season – keeping its batting trump cards more in the dugout than on the field.

Think Kolkata Knight Riders and Andre Russell – who, mind you, has publicly criticised his team for not sending him higher up the order. Think Rajasthan Royals and Ben Stokes. Think Mumbai Indians and Kieron Pollard as well as Hardik Pandya.

MI's case is a little more perplexing, for they have the luxury of possessing two of those weapons in their armoury instead of one.

And thus, although Rohit Sharma & Co have the qualified for the playoffs by playing consistent, all-round cricket through this season, their tactic of sending their biggest hitters lower down the order might bite them in the business end of the tournament.

Consider this: Except for a couple of games out of the 13 this season, Pollard has never batted higher than No. 5. And in the one game out of the two in which he walked in at No. 4, he scored a match-winning 31-ball 83 as the captain against Kings XI Punjab.

Pandya, on the other hand, has been a revelation this season with his jaw-dropping new-found ability of bludgeoning the cricket ball from the get-go. And yet, MI haven't quite fully tapped his outrageous skills.

In nine of the 13 games, Pandya has batted at either No. 6 or 7, often not getting enough deliveries to maximize the damage that he can cause.

On the rare occasion that he got the opportunity to do so, he struck 91 off 34 balls walking in to the crease in the 9th over against Kolkata Knight Riders last Sunday.

Captain Rohit said promoting the double Ps is a plan they would be open to executing in the remaining games.

"That's an option, and we are very much open to that," Sharma said after MI's Super Over win against Sunrisers Hyderabad on Thursday night.

"If you look at the whole tournament, they (Hardik and Pollard) have batted around the 14th or 15th over and they have scored 70-80 runs the maximum number of times. So, we won't forget what they have done," he added.

However, MI's thought-process of sending the likes of Krunal Pandya, Ishan Kishan and Evin Lewis ahead of their dangermen is all the more baffling considering their inability to push the scoring rate in the middle overs.

MI's average score between Overs 6 and 16 has been 84 this season, one of the lowest among all teams. It has restricted them to par totals in many games where they could've possibly aimed at going higher had they pushed either one of Pandya or Pollard earlier.

Incidentally, both the Indian and the Trinidadian have remained not out in six out of the 13 games this season.

Sharma admitted that the team hasn't surged in the middle overs, but put down the think-tank's tactics of reserving his big-hitting duo for late in the innings as a way to counter the opposition's best bowlers.

"You have to look at the composition of the opposition as well, what bowlers they are playing, who are the likely bowlers who will bowl in the middle overs, who will bowl in the death overs.

"We want to exploit that and have that advantage with us. If they have quality bowlers in the middle overs, we can change the plan accordingly. That is the idea when we decide the batting order," he said.

N Zone 

84 Average runs scored by Mumbai Indians between Overs 6 and 16 in the 13 games this season, a run rate of 8.4 runs per over

Did You Know?

Both Hardik Pandya and Kieron Pollard have remained not out in 6 out of the 13 games this season