Sunrisers Hyderabad v Lucknow Super Giants
Thursday 27 March, 14:00
TV: live on Sky Sports
Sunrisers Hyderabad v Lucknow Super Giants IPL team news
Sunrisers Hyderabad posted a massive 286 to win their first game against Rajasthan Royals. They are the most feared batting unit in the competition when on their home surface. The bad news is that they could get stronger.
They picked only three overseas players against Royals, subbing out Travis Head for Adam Zampa. They could add further top-class batting depth by including, say, Kamindu Mendis, for one of Aniket Verma or Abhinav Manohar with Rahul Chahar being preferred as the spin option.
There will be legitimate concerns that despite a massive first-innings total, Royals were still able to smash the bowling to all parts when replying with a commendable 242.
Possible SRH XI: Head (Zampa sub), Abhishek, Ishan, Reddy, Klaasen, Verma, Manohar, Cummins, Simarjeet, Harshal, Shami
Lucknow Super Giants have been handed a major boost with Avesh Khan, the pacer, being declared fit enough to join the squad. Lucknow have suffered terrible injury luck with Mayank Yadav, Akash Deep and Avesh out of action. Mohsin Khan has been ruled out for the season.
One would expect Avesh to come straight into a line-up hurting after failing to defend 210 against Delhi when they had the game in the pocket at 65 for five.
They are heavily reliant on Nic Pooran and Rishabh Pant. The opening partnership of Aiden Markram and Mitch Marsh, neither specialists, is unconvincing.
Possible LSG XI: Marsh (Mukesh Kumar sub), Markram, Pooran, Pant, Badoni, Miller, Shahbaz, Shardul, Bishnoi. Avesh, Prince
Sunrisers Hyderabad v Lucknow Super Giants IPL pitch report
It’s important to remind oneself that the Hyderabad surface has changed in nature. Once it was made into a batting road, four of the last six have busted 200 in the first dig. There were early par lines in the late 180s and then mid 190s for the Sunrisers-Royals game with concerns about which team might bat first. This time the market is overs 224.5. One assumes that will be the mark if Sunrisers bat first. That doesn’t seem out of line.
The bet could be LSG for more than 190 because we’re not convinced that Sunrisers have the bowling nous to keep teams quiet on such a good wicket. Pat Cummins, for example, still flatters to deceive in this format.
Sunrisers Hyderabad v Lucknow Super Giants IPL match prediction
Sunrisers are 1.618/13 to make it two from two. An early show had them at 1.501/2 but the drift would make sense because of the question: what if LSG bat first and are able to post a moderate 190?
Lucknow are 2.608/5 and their awful performance against Delhi, when they also fell away horribly with the bat, makes them an unappetising prospect pre-toss. They absolutely have to bat first to have any chance in this game because it is hard to see their bowling restricting Sunrisers to the sort of 220 mark that, might, give them a sniff.
The best way to back Sunrisers is for over 11.5 sixes at 11/102.11. They only really know one way to play. The total sixes line also looks cheap at 20.5 with Pooran, the most prolific six-hitter in the world, in the LSG ranks.
Back Sunrisers over 11.5 sixes
Sunrisers Hyderabad v Lucknow Super Giants Exchange strategy
One of the trade strategies that we are often keen to highlight in IPL relates to the tied match market. Thanks to the impact player rule, teams should really be able to deploy at least seven bona fide batting options. One can never take for granted that a match will not go down to the wire. See Delhis’ comeback against Lucknow for example.
With the extra batter able to take games to the last over there has often been an opportunity to take chunks out of the tie price. For example, it starts at 50.049/1 here. That will collapse if it looks like the game will go to the last six balls. In-play in the second innings you may get late 20s with the potential to drop by half.
Sunrisers Hyderabad v Lucknow Super Giants player bets
The milestone markets are the ones to consider on such a good batting surface instead of betting one man to outscore the rest. Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma are 13/82.63 and 2/13.00 respectively for a 50. head copped last time so Abhishek may prove popular. For LSG, Pant is 11/53.20. Sportsbook offer 11/26.50 that a century is scored in the match and that could be cheap.
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