Travis Head top-scored with 47 for SRH
Shardul Thakur celebrates a wicket with Ravi Bishnoi • Associated Press
Many expected Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) to post the first 300-plus total of the IPL, and that was not without reason. SRH had posted 286 for 6 in their previous game and LSG were missing a couple of first-choice seamers.
After Rishabh Pant put SRH in, Shardul dismissed Abhishek Sharma and Ishan Kishan off successive balls in the third over of the innings. Abhishek pulled a short ball down the throat of deep square leg, while Kishan was caught down the leg side.
Head tried to put the pressure back on LSG with two sixes and a four off Avesh Khan in the next over. In the last over of the powerplay, he tried to take on Ravi Bishnoi but ended up skying a slog sweep towards long-on where Nicholas Pooran put him down. Later in the over, Bishnoi himself failed to latch on to a tough return catch.
Head was on 35 at the time of the first drop but it cost LSG only 12 as Prince Yadav made a mess of Head’s stumps soon after for his first wicket in the IPL. Nitish Kumar Reddy and Heinrich Klaasen took the side past 100 in the 11th over before Klaasen was run out in a bizarre fashion. Nitish hit a full toss from Prince to the bowler’s left. Prince went for the catch but ended up dropping it. The ball, though, ricocheted onto the stumps at the non-striker’s end with Klaasen well outside his crease. Soon after, Bishnoi castled Nitish for 32 off 28, leaving SRH in a spot of bother.
Aniket Verma smashed Bishnoi for two back-to-back sixes before repeating the feat against Digvesh Rathi in the following over but he fell for 36 off 13 on the last ball of the 16th over. Two balls later, Abhinav Manohar holed out to deep point off Shardul.
Pat Cummins went 6, 6, 6 on the first three balls he faced before getting out on the fourth. But only ten runs came from the last two overs.
