Preview: Sunrisers Hyderabad look for an end to form slump against Rajasthan
Rajasthan Royals and Sunrisers Hyderabad will face off at the Dubai International Stadium on Monday night in the 40th match of the Indian Premier League 2021.
The Royals are at the sixth spot, whereas Kane Williamson-led SRH are languishing at the last spot with only two points.
The match will commence at 7:30 pm (India Time).
Expected playing XI
SRH
David Warner, Wriddhiman Saha (wk), Manish Pandey, Kane Williamson (c), Kedar Jadhav, Abdul Samad, Jason Holder, Rashid Khan, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Khaleel Ahmed, Sandeep Sharma.
RR
David Miller, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Sanju Samson (c & wk), Liam Livingstone, Mahipal Lomror, Riyan Parag, Rahul Tewatia, Chris Morris, Chetan Sakariya, Kartik Tyagi, Mustafizur Rahman.
Probable best performers
Jason Holder
The former West Indies skipper lit up the stadium in the last clash against Punjab Kings. He bagged the Player of the Match award despite his team being five runs short of the target.
Holder’s power-hitting is what the Sunrisers have been lacking every since the beginning of the campaign. If he can continue to score boundaries in a flurry in late overs, Hyderabad will have ample chance of redeeming themselves with consolation wins on the trot.
The all-rounder has carried on his good form from the Caribbean Premier League. Although, he’s part of an IPL side that is already out of the playoffs contention, but Holder will have a chance to raise his stocks in franchise cricket if he continues to perform well in the remaining games for SRH.
Sanju Samson
Samson has been the lone warrior for Rajasthan Royals. After Ben Stokes and Jos Buttler parted ways with the team during the season, he stood head and shoulders above other batters to give some momentum to the Royals.
Unfortunately, his solo contributions don’t seem to be enough for the team. The likes of Liam Livingstone and Yashasvi Jaiswal need to prolong their inning and play a supportive role around the RR skipper.
Rashid Khan
Regardless of pitch conditions, Rashid Khan has been playing his hand in keeping the economy tight at his end. His bowling has kept the opposition’s batter guessing so far.
The Afghanistan leg-spinner enjoys a 5.97 economy this season with 12 wickets in nine games so far. He has, however, lacked support from the batters who haven’t put enough scores on the board to him and the pace cartel to defend with ease.
Match prediction
Despite losing the late game to Delhi Capitals by 33 runs, Rajasthan look fairly in better shape as compared to Kane Williamson and co.
Sunrisers Hyderabad have hit a bad patch that doesn’t seem to end. Their batting line-up is full of T20 royalties but hasn’t yet clicked in the tournament.
Williamson, David Warner and other batters have been extremely inconsistent with the bat. Hence, the Royals should get another two points in the Monday game.
