Sunrisers winning the toss and choosing to field. Cummins goes with three South Africans, with Heinrich Klaasen the no-brainer pick, followed by a retention in the XI for Markram. The fourth is Marco Jansen, the left-arm seamer. As for KKR, Iyer is captaining, so he has recovered from a back spasm. Phil Salt gets a cap right away, walking into the XI after coming in as a late replacement for Jason Roy.
Playing XI for KKR : Phil Salt, Sunil Narine, Venkatesh Iyar, Shreyash Iyar, Nitish Rana, Ramandeep Singh, Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakravarthy, Suyash Sharma(Sub)
Playing XI for SRH : Mayank Agrawal, Rahul Tripathi, Aiden Markram, Heinrich Klassen, Abdul Samad, Shahbaz Ahmad, Marco Jansen, Pat Cummins, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Mayank Markande, T Natarajan, Abhishek Sharma(Sub)
Venkatesh Iyer was the first player on the KKR squad sheet. However, Sunil Narine and Phil Salt emerge. Sit up, nostalgia merchants, but don’t expect fairytales—two bouncers per over are not permitted. Starting for Sunrisers for his eleventh season is Bhuvneshwar Kumar. And it’s a very nice opening.
Following Jansen’s costly opening over, Cummins switched to Natarajan for the fourth over. The strategy has proven to be successful as the bowler has Venkatesh Iyer and Shreyas Iyer mistiming their attempts at lofts over the infield. Midway through the innings, Shreyas was unable to overcome Cummins, while Venkatesh was unable to clear Jansen at cover. The trick is two tall men, and Nattu has two! KKR 32/3 after 4 overs.
Mayank Markande has struck in his first over, getting Nitish Rana to mis-hit a reverse sweep to backward point. Markande is an important cog in the SRH set up with Hasaranga missing today and Washington on the bench. The other spin options in the XI right now are Shahbaz Ahmed and Aiden Markram, but those are dangerous options in this sort of surface.
A promising innings from Salt tonight, finishing on 54 off 40. Markande continues to impress with his wicket-taking in the middle phase. But Sunrisers don’t get a breather, because Rinku is joined by Andre Russell.
Markande has won Russell over in his last over. smashes him for three sixes in the sixteenth over, but in the last ball, Russell mishits a stroke that is too far off, and Markram lunges forward to make a low catch.
Is it out, though? Not very definitive. And the intelligent replay informs us right away that’s not out. Thus, Russell is granted a second chance at life, and Markande ends his 2/39 stint. The umpires call a second time out, but KKR gains momentum after that costly over. 141/6 in 16 KKR.
Russell had a strike-rate of 211 against the seamer (before to this game), therefore the odds were stacked against Bhuvneshwar in this match-up. Then in the 19th over, he mowed down 26 runs by feasting on Bhuvneshwar. While KKR reaches 200 in 19 overs, Bhuvneshwar concludes at 0/51. Finish With 20 over 208.
Second Inning :
Abhishek’s been a powerplay pinch-hitter who SRH have enjoyed great success with. In fact, such is Abhishek’s range of strokes, that in hindsight, he may take offence to being called just a pinch-hitter. He has 16 T20 fifties and will open alongside Mayank Agarwal. T Natarajan is the man subbed out. Starc to open the bowling. Agarwal takes strike.
Sunrisers have a 10-run lead after four overs because to some brilliant smashes through cover and ramps behind point made by Agarwal off of Starc and Rana. As a result, Varun starts the fifth against Abhishek and Shreyas Iyer attempts spin for the first time.
Abhishek almost gets stumped on the first ball, and he almost is caught at backward point on the second. Abhishek’s first two balls are perilous places to reside. However, he clubs Varun for six through cow corner on the third ball, and in 4.3 overs, the team reaches fifty.
After hitting the ball against the turn to end the over with a six over long on, Abhishek makes a costly fifth.
After Agarwall was hit by a short ball from Harshit, Abhishek top-edges a draw to fine leg. Russell is the bowler, and he has a nice way of getting wickets. Following a strong 19-ball 32 as an impact player, Abhishek walks back. Markram enters at that point, and he establishes a boundary right away. Suyash Sharma is the impact substitute for Ramandeep Singh as Sunrisers reach 77 for 2 in eight overs.
When Varun does bowl it full, which isn’t often, he entices Markram to slog past the line. taken by Rinku as he slid forward in the deep, giving KKR some compensation for the successful spells played by their spinners. Heinrich Klaasen is now available as Sunrisers need 98 runs in 45 balls.
After Klaasen hit two sixes off Varun in the previous over, Varun was hit two more times in the 18th over. Sunrisers, who need 40 off 15 balls, suddenly look like they can reach an impossible goal. Russell was hammered for four and six by Samad in the costly 17th over.
Russell got rid of Samad in that over, but the 17th over only yielded 16 runs. Now that Varun’s over has eventually gone for 21 runs, Sunrisers, with Shahbaz and Klaasen, need to score 39 off of 12 balls. Varun gives up 55.
Assigned the task of protecting 12, young Harshit Rana begins by giving up a six to Klaasen. Shahbaz, however, holes out at long on for his cameo of 16 in 5 balls after a single ball later. That indicates that with Jansen covering, Klaasen is still off-target.
When Harshit bowls a slower ball of decent length with five runs needed in two balls, Klaasen edges it towards short third. Suyash, however, had to run behind and makes an amazing tumbling catch while tracking the ball over his shoulder. Gone 63 in 29 means Pat Cummins needs to score five runs in a single ball to win for SRH.
