Hyderabad: (PTI) David Warner will be keen to continue the good show on his road to redemption when a confident Sunrisers Hyderabad take on a struggling Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) in an IPL game here on Sunday.
Despite Sanju Samson scoring an unbeaten 102 not out, Warner (69 off 37 balls) helped Sunrisers chase down a mammoth 199-run target for an impressive five-wicket win, their first of the season, here on Friday night in a high-scoring contest against Rajasthan Royals. After the match, Warner claimed that it wasn’t the easiest of wickets to bat on and praised Samson for his efforts.
He, however, said the conditions could be different on Sunday as it would be an afternoon start. The Aussie opener would be looking to make the most of the early start and put runs on the board again.
Besides Warner, Jonny Bairstow (45 off 28) and Vijay Shankar (35 off 15) batted well too. After Warner and Bairstow set up an ideal platform by adding 110 in the first 10 overs, Shankar continued in the same vein, not letting the momentum slip even once during the run chase.
In the end, Rashid Khan hit a four and a six off Jofra Archer’s successive balls to take Sunrisers home in 19 overs. And come Sunday, Sunrisers batting unit would like to repeat the show against a low on confidence RCB. RCB are yet to register a win from their two outings so far and they would be desperate to turn things around. On the other hand, the focus will be on the pitch, which came in for severe criticism after the IPL opener, when Chennai Super Kings take on Rajasthan Royals in their second home game here on Sunday. The tournament opener saw Royal Challengers Bangalore being shot out for 70, a target that CSK achieved in the 18th over to win by seven wickets.
But the slowness of the track drew criticism from both the captains — Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Virat Kohli. It will interesting to see how the pitch behaves tomorrow. Meanwhile, CSK has started the season with two straight wins and will look to keep the momentum going. After beating Bangalore, they rode on a team effort to prevail over Delhi Capitals in their second outing.
Not known to make too many changes to the playing XI, it remains to be seen if CSK continue to play with just three overseas players, thereby keeping South Africa captain Faf du Plessis in the reserves.
The Super Kings bowlers have delivered on both the occasions so far but same can’t be said about the batting line-up and skipper Dhoni, who shone with the bat against DC, will hope that the rest of the batsmen step up. Veterans Harbhajan Singh, Imran Tahir and Dwayne Bravo came up with impressive performances and will look to do continue the good work.
In contrast, the Rajasthan have lost both their matches so far and would need to step up if they aim to breach the reigning champions’ fortress. (PTI)
