Sunrisers to struggle to stop the rot

Sunrisers Hyderabad will be desperate to get their first points on the board in their third match of this year’s Dream11 IPL against the unbeaten Delhi Capitals. The Sunrisers batting line up will need to change their fortunes if they are going to have any success in this one, against one of the strongest bowling outfits in the competition.

This seasons dark horse?

Before a ball was bowled in the Indian Premier League this year, I am not sure many people would have backed the Delhi Capitals to be one of the favourites. But they have had a very strong start with two wins from their opening two games, and look a well-balanced team in all departments. They could have been seen as being lucky following their super over win against Kings XI Punjab, but any thoughts of them being lucky were diminished when they comprehensively defeated the Chennai Super Kings by 44 runs last time out.

A 94-run opening partnership from Shikhar Dhawan (35) and Prithvi Shaw (64) shown a great maturity in their approach, as opposed to their Gung Ho attack of their first match, which saw them restricted to 20-3. The South African pace duo of Kagiso Rabada and Anrich Nortje did the damage with the ball to keep CSK to just 131-7 in response to Delhi’s 175-3. These are very good signs for a team that are still missing one of their key all-rounders in Ravi Ashwin, who they hope will be back sooner rather than later, to help them keep momentum at the top of the table.

The only way is up

For the Sunrisers Hyderabad, their campaign couldn’t have gotten off to a worse start. Two defeats from two and two performances that will worry captain David Warner. It has been well documented that the Sunrisers middle order lacks the experience of many other teams in the competition, so there is always pressure on the opening pair of Warner and Jonny Bairstow, but so far, the Australian has struggled to find any form. His soft dismissal at the hands of Varun Chakravarthy for a scratchy 36 last time out, shown this.

They need to find a way of getting Kiwi captain Kane Williamson back in to their XI. The anchor has been suffering with a slight niggle but is back to fitness now and is too good a player to be carrying on the drinks. 51 for Manish Pandey will please Head Coach Trevor Bayliss but the bottom line is they need to put more runs on the board, to get more points on the board, and climb the table.

Match Tip

Sunrisers lack of big scores so far, and the potency of the Delhi Capitals bowling attack would make this one seem like a potential low scoring affair. David Warner went against the trend and batted first when winning the toss last time out, and if he does this again, I can’t see the getting a monster score.

I am backing there to be 166.5 runs or less to be scored in the first innings at 1.83 with Bet365.

Bet First innings score of 166 or less on Bet365