The final of the third Major League Cricket season will be played out in Dallas on Sunday night when the two previous champions meet to decide who wins the MLC 2025 title when the Washington Freedom take on the MI New York.
MI New York were the first winners of this tournament but the Washington Freedom took it from them last season. One of them will be the first team to win the competition twice and write themselves down as the standout team.
Washington Freedom
The title defence of the Washington Freedom has lived a bit of a charmed life but they are in the final and now they will be looking to make a successful retention of their crown. To be fair to them, they topped the table with eight wins from 10, although there was a stage deep in the league phase where making the top two had gone out of their own hands let alone topping the table. Having finally finished in top spot they had a right result when Qualifier 1 was washed out ensuring they progressed to this final.
The Freedom slowed down a little bit in the latter stages of the group phase when it came to their batting but they weren’t the only team for that to happen to. In keeping with the trend of the other teams, their bowling delivered the goods the longer the competition went on and that was very much reminiscent of their title win a year ago. They will hope that unit has one more good night in them and that their extended break hasn’t allowed the edge to come off the top of their game.
MI New York
If you had said to MI New York after seven matches of the regular season that they would be in the final of the competition I doubt anyone in their camp would have believed you. At that point they had one win and six defeats and weren’t in the top four in the table but the Seattle Orcas stalled at the right time for them and they suddenly came good, got on a roll and here they are to tell the tale. The good thing for MI New York is they have been playing knockout cricket for much of the last two weeks so that pressure is something they will be used to.
Even in this run to the final, New York have ridden their luck a little bit. They literally fell over the line in the Eliminator earlier in the week and almost let Qualifier 2 get away from them before their experienced players got them home. It might just be that their name is on the trophy and that could give them even more belief than they already have. You get the impression that New York will be competitive in this final, they just need to hope that their luck hasn’t run out.
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Key Players
When you consider that finals are usually won at the top of the order Mitch Owen is undoubtedly a key player for the Washington Freedom in this final, not just to get them off to a fast start but he’ll bowl in the middle overs too.
The longer this tournament has gone on the more the impression that Kieron Pollard has made on it has grown and if the experienced West Indian has another good game in him here then he could return the trophy to MI New York.
Betting
This should be a good final but it is one where it will be interesting to see how the Washington Freedom play here. Their bowling has been that good in recent times that it is two weeks since their batters batted a full 20 over innings and that might just have taken the edge off of them and if it has then there is enough slower bowlers in the MI New York side to take advantage of that. I do think Washington are the better team though so I’m a little reluctant to get involved in the match betting here.
Instead, the 47.5 boundary line could be a little on the high side. Neither of these teams bat extremely deep with out and out batters and both have good bowling options who can take wickets and curtail the run scoring. The Qualifier 2 match was a full game with fair scores in them and we only had 45 boundaries and with the pressure that a final brings we could probably naturally bring that down a notch or two. Both bowling units are going well and with the rain around Texas this week the pitch might not be as true as the organisers would want it. That leaves enough potential for under 47.5 boundaries here. For that line to be covered both teams need to score big and that doesn’t happen in that many finals.
Tips
Back Under 47.5 boundaries for a 3/10 stake at 1.83 with Bet365
