Rohit Sharma congratulates his teammates during the opening match of IPL 2018
The variety in Sunrisers Hyderabad's bowling attack will pose a few tricky questions for Mumbai Indians when the two teams square off in an Indian Premier League encounter on Wednesday. The two teams met with contrasting fortunes in their opening games. While Sunrisers hardly broke a sweat during their emphatic nine-wicket victory over Rajasthan Royals, Mumbai Indians lost a humdinger to CSK in the tournament opener.
Sunrisers is believed to have the most diverse bowling attack in the competition. They have Bhuvneshwar Kumar with his superb skill sets of seam and swing, Billy Stanlake for raw pace and Siddarth Kaul to hit the deck. Add to it Rashid Khan's fast leg-breaks and googlies are still a mystery for most batsmen while Shakib Al Hasan with his orthodox left-arm spin is miserly on most days.
Mumbai Indians, on the other hand, is filled with a galaxy of stars and are often known to be slow starters in a marathon tournament. Skipper Rohit Sharma would be expecting a better effort from his batsmen as 165 on a good batting track wasn't par for the course.
Evin Lewis, who has two T20 hundreds against India, skipper himself and the explosive Kieron Pollard would like to show their big-hitting prowess tomorrow.
For MI, the biggest gain from the opening game was young leg-spinner Mayank Markande's performance on IPL debut as he accounted for Ambati Rayudu and MS Dhoni.
"He (Markande) has got great control of whatever he does, so, I think going forward he will be a great weapon for us," MI Captain Rohit Sharma had said recently.
While googly is his stock ball, it will be interesting to figure how well Markande can bowl his leg-breaks.
Mumbai's another concern will be their death bowling as Jasprit Bumrah, Mustafizur Rahaman and Mitchell McLenaghan all missed their length with Dwayne Bravo going on a rampage during the other night at Wankhede. Hardik Pandya played his heart out but his ankle injury could be a cause of worry for skipper Rohit.
For Sunrisers, it was a good start under new skipper Kane Williamson, who didn't look out of place after David Warner's suspension from the league due to ball tampering charges. Shikhar Dhawan's blazing form has continued, which is the biggest shot in the arm for the 'Orange Army' apart from a bowling attack that looks potent on any surface.
Sunrisers Hyderabad: Kane Williamson (C), Shikhar Dhawan, Manish Pandey, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Wriddhiman Saha, Siddharth Kaul, Deepak Hooda, Khaleel Ahmed, Sandeep Sharma, Yusuf Pathan, Shreevats Goswami, Ricky Bhui, Basil Thampi, T Natarajan, Sachin Baby, Bipul Sharma, Mehdi Hasan, Tanmay Agarwal, Alex Hales, Carlos Brathwaite, Rashid Khan, Shakib Al Hasan, Mohammad Nabi, Chris Jordan and Billy Stanlake.
Mumbai Indians: Rohit Sharma (C), Jasprit Bumrah, Hardik Pandya, Kieron Pollard, Mustafizur Rahman, Pat Cummins, Suryakumar Yadav, Krunal Pandya, Ishan Kishan, Rahul Chahar, Evin Lewis, Saurabh Tiwary, Ben Cutting, Pradeep Sangwan, Jean-Paul Duminy, Tajinder Singh, Sharad Lumba, Siddhesh Lad, Aditya Tare, Mayank Markande, Akila Dananjaya, Anukul Roy, Mohsin Khan, MD Nidheesh, Mitchell McClenaghan.
(With PTI Inputs)
