(Cricket news) League leaders Gujarat Titans take on Sunriser Hyderabad in match number 40 as both teams look to go to the top of the table. The only loss that GT have suffered was at the hands of SRH and they will look to avenge it. This clash will be one for the bowlers, while Titans have the experience of Rashid Khan, Mohammed Shami, Lockie Ferguson and Hardik Pandya, Hyderabad have the plethora of talent in Umran Malik, Marko Jansen, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and T Natarajan.
Gujarat Titans haven’t put a foot wrong in this year’s tournament as they have worked well as an unit. Titans' batting has largely revolved around their captain Hardik Pandya and Shubman Gill. While Abhinav Manohar and Rahul Tewatia have applied finishing touches at different points, the overall balance of the line-up still appears shaky, but then again David Miller has been in terrific form, helping them win matches single handedly. Their bowling has been supreme, in the last match we saw them defend 150 quite comfortably as the likes of Lockie Ferguson, Mohammed Shami and now Yash Dayal have been complimenting each other really well together. The Titans have the second best bowling average at 25.79 and also the second best economy rate in the tournament with 8.22 rpo.
After losing their first three matches, Sunrisers Hyderabad looked like they were heading for an early exit from the tournament but after 5 consecutive wins, it looks like they are now one of the favourites for the title this year. In terms of batting, things have drastically changed this year with the arrival of Rahul Tripathi, Nicholas Pooran and Aiden Markram who are slowly but steadily finding their groove this season. This year, SRH batters have averaged 51 between overs 7 and 15 and strike their runs at close to 150. Rahul Tripathi will be the key for SRH against Rashid Khan as he has scored 135 runs against him and only been dismissed once by him. For SRH, Washington Sundar is back from injury and may replace J Suchith in the playing XI.
Pitch and weather report: The Wankhede pitch has been good for batting as the trend of flat decks might just continue. Over the last five matches at this venue, teams batting first have won as dew hasn’t been much of a factor. The temperature is going to hover around 33 degrees with no chances of rain.
Interesting facts:
- The average first innings score at Wankhede was 149 in the first four matches. It's now risen to 186 in the last five matches.
- Gill has struggled against Bhuvneshwar in the IPL, managing only 32 runs off 37 balls at a strike rate of 86.48 while being dismissed twice.
- Sunrisers (40) and Titans (37) have hit the least sixes among the ten teams this season.
- Shami has dismissed Kane Williamson 4 times while conceding only 66 runs off 47 balls.
- SRH have won just one match at the Wankhede Stadium.
Also read: Great players go through phases like this: Du Plessis on Kohli
Probable XI for SRH:
Kane Williamson (capt), 2 Abhishek Sharma, 3 Rahul Tripathi, 4 Aiden Markram, 5 Nicholas Pooran (wk), 6 Shashank Singh, 7 J Suchith/Washington Sundar, 8 Bhuvneshwar Kumar, 9 Marco Jansen, 10 Umran Malik, 11 T Natarajan
Probable XI for GT:
1 Shubman Gill, 2 Wriddhiman Saha (wk), 3 Hardik Pandya (capt), 4 David Miller, 5 Rahul Tewatia, 6 Abhinav Manohar, 7 Rashid Khan, 8 Alzarri Joseph, 9 Lockie Ferguson, 10 Mohammed Shami, 11 Yash Dayal
