matching details
Sunrisers Hyderabad (5th) vs Rajasthan Royals (1st)
Hyderabad, 1930 IST (1400 GMT)
The big picture – best bowling team vs best batting team
Rajasthan Royals have given up a score of over 200 only once in a season where such scores occur every other day. Sunrisers Hyderabad made and then reset the record of the highest score in IPL history. This contest between the best bowling side and the best batting side of IPL has been going on for a long time.
With Trent Boult and his penchant for taking wickets in the first over, the Royals are one of two teams to average under 30 in the powerplay (the other being Gujarat Titans). They are also giving runs at the rate of only 8 runs per over. Can they maintain this while facing Abhishek Sharma, Travis Head and Heinrich Klaasen on a ground where sixes have become so common that one is hit every two overs? (11.1 per innings in IPL 2024)
form guide
Sunrisers Hyderabad LLWWW (last five matches, most recent first)
Rajasthan Royals WWWWL
Team News and Impact Player Strategies
Sunrisers Hyderabad
Sunrisers may consider bringing back their legspinner Mayank Markandey in place of fingerspinner Shahbaz Ahmed. Given the number of right-handed batsmen in the Royals line-up, they could use both, but this year, Hyderabad have found it easier to hit the spinners (8.3 balls per six) than the fast bowlers (11.9). Also, Sanju Samson is the best spin six-hitter (39) since IPL 2022. Jos Buttler (31) is fourth in the list. T Natarajan is likely to continue as an impact player, subbing in and out for the batsman like Anmolpreet Singh.
Possible XII: 1 Travis Head, 2 Abhishek Sharma, 3 Aiden Markram, 4 Heinrich Klaasen (wk), 5 Nitish Kumar Reddy, 6 Abdul Samad, 7 Pat Cummins (c), 8 Mayank Markande/Shahbaz Ahmed, 9 Bhuvneshwar Kumar, 10 Jaydev Unadkat , 11 T Natarajan, 12 Anmolpreet Singh
Rajasthan Royals
The strength of their bowling comes at the expense of their batting depth. It only goes down to No. 7, with R Ashwin as a floater in the line-up, and lengthens it out if needed. Fortunately, with their openers capable of playing the full 20 overs alone and Samson and Riyan Parag also being in form, they don’t really need lower-order support. Yuzvendra Chahal is his usual impact sub.
Possible XII: 1 Yashasvi Jaiswal, 2 Jos Buttler, 3 Sanju Samson (captain and wicketkeeper), 4 Riyan Parag, 5 Dhruv Jurel, 6 Shimron Hetmyer, 7 Rovman Powell, 8 R Ashwin, 9 Trent Boult, 10 Avesh Khan, 11 Sandeep Sharma, 12 Yuzvendra Chahal
In the spotlight – Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Shimron Hetmyer
statistics matter
- How mature Samson has become can be gauged from the way he is progressing his innings. Earlier it seemed that he will get into trouble and then play big shots to get out of it and it will not work. For example, in IPL 2022, he was out nine times between overs 7 and 10. In IPL 2024, he is yet to get out in this period while scoring runs at a strike rate of 139. Part of this may be an improvement in their play against spin. 36% of the balls played against him in IPL 2022 became dots. This figure is 19% less in IPL 2024.
- Chahal has a great record against SRH with 28 wickets in 19 innings and an average of 18.9, which is his second lowest average for an IPL team after his current team. So it is important that SRH find a way to get Heinrich Klaasen on board. In his T20 match, he scored 93 runs, 41 balls and three dismissals.
- Head and Abhishek have been an excellent combo for Sunrisers, one a pace-hitter, the other a spin-hitter. Their complementing each other could also come in handy in this contest as Head has good T20 history with Boult (36 runs in 17 balls) and Abhishek (11 runs in 18 balls and one out).
- The investment both franchises have made in their youth is paying off. Royals have developed Yashasvi Jaiswal and Parag into IPL stars. Both batsmen are scoring more than 154 runs, with Parag already scoring more runs this year than the previous two batsmen. SRH invested Rs 6.5 crore to acquire Abhishek in the 2022 auction and he has become a high-impact top-order player, hitting more sixes than fours this season.
pitch and conditions
The average first innings total in Hyderabad in IPL 2024 is 216. Tells you everything you need to know.
Citation
“We’re very proud of the players who made it. They’ve worked really hard. It’s been tough for all the players out there and until the final announcement is made, I can understand what’s going through their minds. Must have been.” But I think a lot of credit should be given to those players as well, they tried their best to eliminate all that and try to play the IPL and it worked out for them and the way they played and the way they played. The way he played. The adaptations we’ve made have worked for them, so I think it’s a great lesson for all of us that when you settle into something and you’re committed to making it work, The results are often not positive.” Rajasthan Royals’ Kumar Sangakkara All praise for the six players from their team who will represent their countries in the 2024 T20 World Cup
Alagappan Muthu is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
