Sunrisers Hyderabad, who have seven wins from 11 matches, take on table-toppers Chennai Super Kings in Match 54 of the Pepsi IPL 2013.
Sunrisers Hyderabad, unbeaten at home this season, demolished the Delhi Daredevils in their previous outing. The Chennai Super Kings must be hurting from their defeat to the Mumbai Indians; the two-time champions were dismissed for their lowest-ever total in their previous match. CSK coach Stephen Fleming had warned the team about being complacent and that defeat has served as a wake-up call to a team that had won seven matches in a row prior to that.
Sunrisers Hyderabad are locked in a tight mid-table race for the Play-Off berths and will be eyeing at least three more wins. Chennai Super Kings will eye a win to rule out even the mathematical possibility of the team getting eliminated from the race to the Play-Offs. They will also be eyeing a finish among the top two teams in the table.
When
Wednesday, May 8, 2013, 8 p.m
Where
Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium, Hyderabad
The Protagonists
The two impact players in the Sunrisers Hyderabad batting line-up are Shikhar Dhawan and Thisara Perera. Dhawan, who smashed his way into the record books by scoring the fastest century by a Test debutant, missed the first few games because of injury but has been hitting the ball well since returning to the team. SRH need big runs from him at the top, and hope Thisara Perera, who has a strike-rate of 148, can hit some big ones towards the end of the innings. With Hyderabad being one of those venues where the bowlers have ruled the roost, SRH will need Amit Mishra and Darren Sammy, two bowlers who can take the pace of the ball, to keep things quiet.
As always, CSK will expect runs from Michael Hussey, Suresh Raina and MS Dhoni – three players who have played match-winning knocks on more than a couple of occasions this season. However, given the bowler friendly conditions this match is likely to be played on; the spotlight will be on the overs bowled by Ravindra Jadeja and R Ashwin. It will be interesting to see if CSK adopt the horses-for-courses policy and beef their spin-bowling line-up by including one of Akila Dananjaya, Shadab Jakati or Baba Aparajith.
Previous Meetings
In the only meeting between the Sunrisers Hyderabad and Chennai Super Kings at Chennai earlier this season, it was the hosts who emerged victors. After restricting the visitors to 159 for six, CSK – riding on skipper MS Dhoni’s onslaught – got past the target in the final over, winning by five wickets.
Trivia
The average first innings total in IPL matches at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium this season is 118 – the lowest among all the venues which have hosted matches this season.
The overall economy rate of spinners in the five matches at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium this season is 5.64.
What Next
Sunrisers Hyderabad head to Mohali next to take on Kings XI Punjab on May 11, while Chennai Super Kings head north to Jaipur to take on the Rajasthan Royals on May 12.
