Sunrisers defend 126 on IPL debut

 

Sunrisers Hyderabad 126 for 6 (Perera 30) beat Pune Warriors 104 (Steyn 3-11, Mishra 3-19) by 22 runs

Dale Steyn took three in four balls to close out the match

Sunrisers Hyderabad made a winning debut in the IPL as they defended a low score at their home ground on a slow, difficult pitch. Thisara Perera, Sunrisers’ $675,000 acquisition, did not begin too badly for his new franchise, top-scoring with a quick 30, taking the first two Pune Warriors wickets and causing a run-out. Amit Mishra wasn’t too far behind, his legbreaks leaving Warriors confounded on a helpful surface. Dale Steyn left the Warriors top order dazed with his outswingers and returned to blow away the lower order with three wickets in four balls.

Not many would have given Sunrisers a chance when they almost sleepwalked their way to 126 after being put in, barring a brief effort to break free from Perera. Deccan Chargers, the franchise Sunrisers replaced, had an atrocious record at this ground, and Sunrisers appeared set to extend that in front of a lukewarm turnout. But they came out a different unit with the ball.

Steyn, charged up as almost always, beat the Warriors openers repeatedly with quick outswingers. Ishant Sharma was correct and testing, as he can be in helpful conditions. The wickets came Perera’s way, though.

After running him fine for a boundary, Robin Uthappa tried repeating the stroke and went caught behind. Marlon Samuels gave the lone slip catching practice in Perera’s next over, Kumar Sangakkara deserving credit for sticking with the fielder and the bowler.

Warriors’ batting line-up stretched way down to No. 8 Mitchell Marsh, but it was to come unstuck as Mishra brought out his control and variations. Yuvraj Singh, on IPL comeback, walked down, and was easily beaten and stumped. Manish Pandey’s struggle to put bat to ball ended with a mishit slog off Mishra, as the asking-rate started mounting.

Almost everything clicked for Sangakkara on the field. He needed young Ashish Reddy to bowl a decent 17th over, and the bowler responded by uprooting Ross Taylor’s leg stump with a full, slower delivery.

With 33 needed off three overs, Perera was to make another important contribution. Angelo Mathews, who came in at No. 7, smashed a full toss straight back at Perera, who stuck out his right hand, and the dangerous Marsh was caught short of his crease at the non-striker’s end.

Warriors’ lower order panicked against Steyn, trying to attack the fast bowler while their captain looked on helplessly from the other end, ruing that his team left as many as seven deliveries unused.

Sunrisers used up their quota when they batted, but weren’t able to find any momentum. The top four got only starts, and it was down to Perera to breathe some life into a suffocating innings. He began with consecutive fours off Rahul Sharma and slogged Marlon Samuels’ darts for two more boundaries before mishitting an Ashok Dinda full toss in the 18th over. Perera’s fall meant Sunrisers weren’t able to finish well with the bat, but they were far more determined with the ball.

New beginnings in Hyderabad

Match facts

Friday, April 5, 2013
Start time 2000 (1430 GMT) 

Yuvraj Singh will be playing in the IPL after nearly two years

After the top two teams of last year’s points table kicked-off the carnival on Wednesday, the bottom two will meet in Hyderabad on Friday. While the host city has a new team – Sunrisers Hyderabad – led by the same captain Kumar Sangakkara, Pune Warriors have a new captain – Angelo Mathews – after Michael Clarke was ruled out of the entire season.

 

Sunrisers will feel the absence of an in-from Shikhar Dhawan, who was Deccan Chargers’ leading run-scorer last season. After retaining 20 players from the Chargers, Sunrisers revamped their leadership, bringing together Tom Moody and Sangakkara, who had worked together as coach and captain for Sri Lanka. They also have overseas pace options in Dale Steyn and Clint McKay, and allrounders Darren Sammy and Thisara Perera, but only Steyn picks himself.

 

Warriors had an unsettled team last year and the addition of Mathews, Ajantha Mendis, Ross Taylor, Abhishek Nayar, and the return of Yuvraj Singh, will bolster their prospects. Steve Smith is more a batsman than allrounder these days and Warriors will be tempted to include Clarke’s replacement, Aaron Finch, who scored two fifties and a hundred against England Lions recently. With Marlon Samuels, Luke Wright, Wayne Parnell also in the squad, a right balance might not be easy to find.

 

 

Players to watch

Kumar Sangakkara scored 48, 63, 139, 55, 142, 105 and 58 in the recent ODIs and Tests against Bangladesh. He will now have to score in the shortest format against compatriots Ajantha Mendis and Mathews, among others. His captaincy will also be under the spotlight, because he led Chargers to only four wins last season.

 

Yuvraj Singh scored consecutive fifties in the Deodhar Trophy and took 3 for 39 and 3 for 19 in the Vijay Hazare Trophy, so his recent form has been promising. With captaincy off his shoulders, and having missed all of 2012, he will want to score more than the two fifties he scored in 2011.

 

 

Stats and trivia

• Both Sunrisers and Warriors won only four out of their 16 matches last season
• Warriors did not have a single bowler in the top-20 wicket-takers last season. Ashish Nehra, now with Delhi Daredevils, took 11 wickets for them and was in 26th place. Their leading run-scorer, Robin Uthappa, was 12th with 405 runs.

 

 

 

Quotes

“I am not looking far ahead. I am not looking at the semi-finals or anything like that. I just want to concentrate on every game, and on what we do in every game.”
Allan Donald, the Warriors coach.

 

“We have got replacements who are probably good enough to do the job and we are excited to give that opportunity to a younger guy.”
Sunrisers captain Kumar Sangakkara believes his team has replacements for injured players, such as Shikhar Dhawan.

 

Hyderabad set to debut in new avatar

SUNRISERS HYDERABAD V PUNE WARRIORS, IPL 2013, HYDERABAD

 

Match facts

Friday, April 5, 2013
Start time 2000 (1430 GMT)

Big Picture

After the top two teams of last year’s points table kicked-off the carnival on Wednesday, the bottom two will meet in Hyderabad on Friday. While the host city has a new team – Sunrisers Hyderabad – led by the same captain Kumar Sangakkara, Pune Warriors have a new captain – Angelo Mathews – after Michael Clarke was ruled out of the entire season.

Sunrisers will feel the absence of an in-from Shikhar Dhawan, who was Deccan Chargers’ leading run-scorer last season. After retaining 20 players from the Chargers, Sunrisers revamped their leadership, bringing together Tom Moody and Sangakkara, who had worked together as coach and captain for Sri Lanka. They also have overseas pace options in Dale Steyn and Clint McKay, and allrounders Darren Sammy and Thisara Perera, but only Steyn picks himself.

Warriors had an unsettled team last year and the addition Ajantha Mendis, Ross Taylor, Abhishek Nayar, and the return of Yuvraj Singh, will bolster their prospects. Steve Smith is more a batsman than allrounder these days and Warriors will be tempted to include Clarke’s replacement, Aaron Finch, who scored two fifties and a hundred against England Lions recently. With Marlon Samuels, Luke Wright, Wayne Parnell also in the squad, a right balance might not be easy to find.

Players to watch

Kumar Sangakkara scored 48, 63, 139, 55, 142, 105 and 58 in the recent ODIs and Tests against Bangladesh. He will now have to score in the shortest format against compatriots Ajantha Mendis and Mathews, among others. His captaincy will also be under the spotlight, because he led Chargers to only four wins last season.

Yuvraj Singh scored consecutive fifties in the Deodhar Trophy and took 3 for 39 and 3 for 19 in the Vijay Hazare Trophy, so his recent form has promised. With captaincy off his shoulders, and having missed all of 2012, he will want to score more than the two fifties he scored in 2011.

Stats and trivia

• Warriors won only four out of their 16 matches last season
• Warriors did not have a single bowler in the top-20 wicket-takers last season. Ashish Nehra, now with Delhi Daredevils, took 11 wickets for them and was in 26th place. Their leading run-scorer, Robin Uthappa, was 12th with 405 runs.

Quotes

“I am not looking far ahead. I am not looking at the semi-finals or anything like that. I just want to concentrate on every game, and on what we do in every game.”
Allan Donald, the Warriors coach.

“We have got replacements who are probably good enough to do the job and we are excited to give that opportunity to a younger guy.”
Sunrisers captain Kumar Sangakkara believes his team has replacements for injured players, such as Shikhar Dhawan.

Warriors hope it’s third-time lucky

 

Big picture

Angelo Mathews will be Pune Warriors’ third captain in three years

 

Sunrisers may be the newest entrants to the IPLparivaar (family) but it would be Warriors who would be seen in a new avatar. Since their bottom-placed finish last year, a lot of water has flown under the bridge. When it came to running the team, it was a one-man army last year, with Sourav Ganguly acting as a captain-mentor.

Come 2013, and Ganguly is nowhere in the picture. Instead, it’s Allan Donald who has been raised from a bowling coach to the head coach. And for the third time during their third year in IPL, Warriors have appointed a new captain at the start of the season. Beyond the captain and the navigator of the ship lie the real changes. There are more than a dozen changes to the squad that represented Warriors last year.

Those who attended Donald’s half-hour interaction with the press would realise that their homework has been near- perfect. Warriors made far too many changes to their line-up last year. As a result, only one player – Robin Uthappa – featured in each of their 16 games, while a whopping 23 players got at least a game. As a result, the team combination was far from settled throughout the season.

This time around, though, Donald and Co have decided to downsize the squad for every game from 33 to 16, if not 15. And the thrust during the build-up hasn’t just been on adding match-winning overseas cricketers. As a result, domestic stars like Abhishek Nayar, Ishwar Pandey, T Suman and Parvez Rasool, who became the first player from Jammu & Kashmir to have been signed by an IPL franchise after impressive domestic season, have indeed made Warriors a formidable outfit at least on paper.

The coming weeks will tell us whether the line-up that looks as impressive as any other on paper delivers the goods on the field.

 

Key Players

He was the captain and the marquee player during their inaugural season and was forced to watch Warriors from the sidelines during IPL 2012. Warriors will be looking forward to Yuvraj Singh marking his return to IPL in style. Despite being the star of India’s triumphant world titles in both the shorter versions of the game, Yuvraj hasn’t really lived up to his potential in the IPL so far. Warriors would be hoping that the next two months help Yuvraj change that.

Once it was decided that Yuvraj won’t be considered for captaincy and Michael Clarke pulled out due to occur over again his back injury, Angelo Mathews emerged as the leading candidate to skipper the side. Mathews is already a vital cog in terms of the balance of the team, and his elevation has increased the responsibility on him further. Mathews would be hoping to draw all the experience he has gained from leading Sri Lanka in Tests and ODIs recently.

 

Big names in

The signing of Ross Taylor from Delhi Daredevils can help Warriors fill the gap of the floater they missed all through the last season. Taylor will be desperate to feel at home with what will be his fourth IPL team. And if the track for their home games is as slow and low as it was during the last year, Ajantha Mendis can be a handful with his not-so-mysterious-anymore spin bowling. Mind you, Mendis may be a familiar proposition for regulars at the international stage, but he can be destructive against the domestic batsmen. 

 

Big names out

Michael Clarke’s unavailability for the entire duration of the tournament is a big blow for Warriors. Though Clarke isn’t exactly renowned for his Twenty20 skills, he is widely regarded as one of the most enterprising captains in the world cricket. It is his leadership ability that Warriors will sorely miss. 

 

Availability

Ross Taylor is likely to miss the latter half of the tournament due to New Zealand’s tour to England. And Tamim Iqbal, who injured himself during a ODI in Sri Lanka last week, is unlikely to be available for at least the first half of the tournament due to Bangladesh’s tour of Zimbabwe.