Warner brought up his sixth half-century off the season, but it was rather unfortunate that, in trying to get a single off Axar Patel, his back foot accidentally disturbed the stumps. Yuvraj Singh, however, remained unbeaten and he played the flawless finisher’s knock, scoring 42 off 24 balls to take Hyderabad home.
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In the Kings XI Punjab, Anureet Singh and Farhan Behardien were replaced by Gurkeerat Singh and Glenn Maxwell. Vijay, a class act himself, missed out but there were cameos from fellow India bats Wriddhiman Saha and Gurkeerat Singh, both chipping in with scores of 27. While he did get the crucial wicket of Murali Vijay, it wasn’t one of his better performances. Despite the early loss of M Vijay – who spooned a well-disguised slower ball from Mustafizur Rahman to mid-off – the Kings XI innings soon gathered momentum.
Undeterred, Amla dropped anchor and carried on in the company of Saha. The duo helped the side cross the 100-run mark and stay on course for a competitive total.
However, Hooda departed when he lobbed a Sandeep Sharma delivery to David Miller at deep midwicket.
Thereafter, it was all Samson and Pant show as the youngsters played sensibly and mixed caution with aggression to stitch an unbeaten 72 run stand for the fourth wicket that came off just 50 balls. For Kohli, it was his third hundred in seven games.
With the onset of final five overs, Amla switched gears and went after Henriques and moved into his 70s with a 13-run over. He struck 14 boundaries and two sixes during his knock. With Hashim Amla’s superb 56-ball 96 knock, they would have expected a different result last night against Hyderabad. Substitute fielder Vijay Shankar, filling in for injured Nehra, dropped a tough chance off Mustafizur at sweeper cover on the first ball of the penultimate over when the batsman was on 93. Bhuvneshwar combined with Warner to deprive Amla of the milestone when the batsman was just a stroke away. Amla finally perished for 96 from 56 but in the process hit 14 fours and two sixes. Previous captain David Miller was unable to inspire the team, either with his leadership or his batting. Openers David Warner and Shikhar Dhawan have led the way with the bat. The wickets to fall were Unmukt Chand for a duck off the bowling of Mohit Sharma and Ambati Rayudu for a duck off the bowling of Sandeep Sharma.
Mohit Sharma got a direct hit from the long-on, cutting short the opening partnership as Dhawan fell short off the crease at the non-striker’s end by a small margin. Total: (for 3 wickets in 17 overs) 127. “For pride’s sake we want to put up a good show against RCB and one more game in the end against Pune”, Vijay told a news conference at PCA stadium after the defeat against the Sunrisers.
However, it will be interesting to see whom the crowds root for when Yuvraj Singh comes out to bat for SRH. Along with Hooda, Yuvraj put on 42 runs in under four overs to keep Sunrisers in the hunt. Meanwhile, the Kings XI are all but out of the hunt now and will be looking a consolation win against the Royal Challengers in Bangalore.
Now 20 runs were needed off two overs.
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Captain Warner is one of the highest run-getters in this edition and he single-handedly led the team to victory a few times. Before the Mumbai game, they almost beat Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB), falling short by just a single run, largely due to some needless attempts at flamboyant, improvised shots by the batsmen.
