So much has changed since Mumbai Indians and Royal Challengers Bengaluru met on the opening night of the season. That evening, the defending champions appeared to have the game sewn up before Nadine de Klerk pulled the rug from under them. What should have been an early stumble instead became the spark for something far bigger.

RCB have not looked back since. Five straight wins this season, six if one counts the victory that closed out their campaign last year, have carried them into the playoffs first and etched a record winning streak in WPL history. The momentum has been decisive, controlled, with as many as five different players winning the Player of the Match accolade.

MI's story over the same stretch has unfolded very differently. Just two wins so far, despite retaining the core of a side that delivered the team its second championship last year. The issues have been both of tempo and consistency, and they have surfaced almost immediately at the top of the order. As many as four opening combinations have been trialled, none of them managing to consistently cash in on the PowerPlay. It is evidenced in the stat that they have the slowest scoring openers. The consequence has been familiar: Harmanpreet Kaur and Nat Sciver-Brunt repeatedly forced into roles of consolidation and counterattack rather than acceleration from a position of strength.

With two league games left, time is beginning to work against MI. They find themselves, somewhat unexpectedly, on the fringes of the qualification race. And yet, with the mid-table still tightly bunched, the door has not closed entirely. A late surge remains possible, if they can finally align their phases.

RCB will be alert to that possibility. In a long tournament, early momentum can secure qualification, but it is late-season rhythm that often decides trophies. Having stumbled for the first time in this campaign two nights ago, RCB will hope that defeat remains an outlier, and not the beginning of a pattern, just as emphatic as the one that carried them here after the last MI clash.