Mayank Yadav continues to be on the bench for his fifth match in a row as Lucknow Super Giants go with an unchanged team for their clash against Rajasthan Royals at the Ekana Cricket Stadium on Saturday. The pace merchant has been on the sidelines due to an abdominal soreness and his last game came 20 days before against Gujarat Titans.
RR have won the toss and have opted to bowl first as they look for a payback against LSG, who defeated the 2008 champions in their reverse fixture. Both the teams are going unchanged.
"We will bowl first. Looks like a decent wicket to bowl, but no guarantees. This season has been a bit different, some extra days in between games, that gives us time to rest and recover. We're playing the same team. IPL has been completely different, it's normal to get carried away looking at other teams, but the talk in our camp is to stay with the flow, we have been playing some good cricket and we need to continue doing so. I don't need to talk to him, he's been a top professional and has a big role in our plans (on Ravi Ashwin)," Sanju Samson said at the toss.
"The wicket is good, there's not much dew in Lucknow and the wicket will play well for the entire 40 overs. We'll need to play some good cricket. It's nice to get past 200, every team would like to do so, but the dimensions of this ground favours the bowlers a bit more and we've enjoyed it. No changes for us. Every player goes through a bit of time like that when you can't get runs ( asked about Padikkal's form). He looks good in the nets and he'll have to stay positive, you saw last night when Jonny came back after getting dropped and then getting a hundred," KL Rahul said at toss time.
Mayank Yadav missed out on the previous four matches for Lucknow due to abdominal soreness. The assistant coach S Sriram did not confirm his availability for the game against the Royals and said that he is pretty close to make a return.
"He's bowling today in the nets. So we'll find out how he pulls up after today, he's pretty close, so ya hopefully, fingers crossed," Sriram said on the eve of the game.
Rajasthan Royals (Playing XI): Yashasvi Jaiswal, Jos Buttler, Sanju Samson(w/c), Rovman Powell, Shimron Hetmyer, Dhruv Jurel, Ravichandran Ashwin, Trent Boult, Avesh Khan, Sandeep Sharma, Yuzvendra Chahal
Lucknow Super Giants (Playing XI): Quinton de Kock, KL Rahul(w/c), Marcus Stoinis, Deepak Hooda, Nicholas Pooran, Ayush Badoni, Krunal Pandya, Matt Henry, Ravi Bishnoi, Mohsin Khan, Yash Thakur
