David Warner had no hesitation in deciding to bowl first as the Sunrisers Hyderabad won the toss in their match against the Kolkata Knight Riders on Saturday. Warner’s reasoning augured well on two fronts in that not only were KKR, the hosts for the day, adept at chasing down targets, but the prevailing conditions on the field would have suited the team batting second.
However, on the day his bowlers played their part fully, with Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Ashish Nehra reining in KKR’s batting both at the start of their innings, and in the death overs, there seemed to be some miscommunication among his batting order. Suffice to say then that watching his team chase down the required 173-run target would make the skipper rue his decision in hindsight.
Contrary to the wariness with which they had opened their batting in the previous matches, SRH’s openers – Warner and Shikhar Dhawan – started aggressively by picking apart KKR’s opening seam bowlers, putting up 32 runs in the first four overs.
Introducing spinners into the attack, two overs before the end of the Powerplay, did reassert Gautam Gambhir’s innovative captaincy. For SRH, though, it brought out the biggest chink in their team armoury – of the susceptibility of their middle-order.
Four matches into the new IPL season, and the defending champions are slowly coming to terms about the way their middle-order has let them down, allowing their opponents to make inroads into the game. In their opening two matches, against the Royal Challengers Bangalore and Gujarat Lions, this drawback of theirs was quite camouflaged.
Against RCB, Dhawan, Moises Henriques, and Yuvraj Singh combined to post 154 runs after Warner had been dismissed cheaply for 14. Against GL, they chased down the 136-run target comfortably, losing just one wicket in the process. Their third match, against the Mumbai Indians, however, gave a sign of things to come.
Following the 81-run opening wicket stand between Warner and Dhawan, the team lost quick wickets, with their middle-order contributing just 44 runs, before winding up their 20-over quota with just 158.
Over-zealous Yuvraj
The Sunrisers did miss out on Henriques and Bipul Sharma in the match, but what does it say about the team’s lineup that it isn’t able to make do without sudden, and unexpected, unavailability of few players? Especially, if the team has invested in a sharp-hitter like Yuvraj Singh.
Speaking of whom, barring his opening match deliverance, Yuvraj has had quite slow working days on the field. Against KKR on Saturday, he went on the offensive, pinch-hitting with a couple of sixes.
But with his team needing him to be their bracing front out on the middle, there was a smidgen of frivolity on his part as he tried to hasten his side’s progress. Singh’s over-zealousness, thus, cost him his wicket as he was caught at long-on after trying to clear the fielder – Rishi Dhawan – positioned in the area.
With crucial matches lined up ahead for SRH, starting with two consecutive home matches against Kings XI Punjab and Delhi Daredevils on Monday and Wednesday respectively, Tom Moody and his men need to quickly address their predicament. And, it’s far more pressing than getting a replacement laptop, with their entire title defence balanced on the barest of batting edges.
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