When the former champions Sunrisers face off against a confident Shreyas Iyer-led Punjab Kings in a must-win clash at home on Saturday at the Rajiv Gandhi Stadium, skipper Pat Cummins will be hoping for a comprehensive all-round display to help the team rediscover its winning rhythm.
Hyderabad: For Sunrisers Hyderabad, a six-day break after suffering four straight losses could have been just what the doctor prescribed to make a serious introspection and get the act right to avoid being left far behind in the hunt for a place in the play-offs of the IPL.
So, when the former champions, Sunrisers, take on a confident Shreyas Iyer-led Punjab Kings in a must win game at home on Saturday here at Rajiv Gandhi Stadium, Pat Cummins should be looking for a complete all-round performance to regain the winning formula.
For, another defeat for Sunrisers in what can be the most crucial league match certainly means an extremely daunting task for his team to look ahead with optimism.
It is not that Sunrisers, bottom-placed with one win and four losses in five games, is not capable of producing the kind of performances it is largely expected to. But, somewhere the links are missing. The
biggest bane was the failure of the explosive openers Abhishek Sharma and Travis Head. Even as Heinrich Klaasen pointed out after one of the losses earlier that they have the depth in batting despite the openers failing, it is too glaring that the batting line-up struggles to come good when they disappoint.
Even the bowling department too looks ordinary in the face of controlled aggression the opposition line-ups had shown in the previous games. Most of the bowlers have been pretty expensive and never really getting the breakthroughs at the right time. It looks a lot depends on Cummins again to lead from the front.
It will be interesting to see what kind of a pitch is available for tomorrow after the comparatively slower one had undone the game-plan of the home team in the last game.
On the other hand, fourth-placed Punjab Kings is on a high with three wins and a loss in four games.
And, the focus will be on the young opening sensation Priyansh Arya even as captain Shreyas, Prabhsimran Singh, Marcus Stoinis, NehalWadhera and Glenn Maxwell are expected to come good with the bat.
In bowling, India star and left-arm pacer Arshdeep Singh leads the pace attack with the likes of Yash Thakur, Marco Jansen and that middle-overs specialist Lockie Ferguson backing him while Glenn Maxwell and Yuzvendra Chahal handle the spin department. How good they will be up against the SRH line-up if the latter fires on all cylinders can well be interesting?
