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THURSDAY, APRIL 14, 2016
SPORTS
Pune to face Gujarat in clash of debutants Overall, the Lions look like a good package but they will be tested by the Supergiants, who
GOOD START: Gujarat Lions cricketers celebrate during their debut IPL match against Kings XI Punjab in Mohali on Monday. – AFP
are looking the most formidable outfit this year in the League
RAJKOT: Rising Pune Supergiants and Gujarat Lions, after making impressive debuts in their respective openers, will test each others’ strengths in the Indian Premier League (IPL), here on Thursday. The two teams feature a lot of faces from the suspended Chennai Super Kings and at least six players, who played in the same side till last year, will now be in opposite
camps. CSK teammates Mahendra Singh Dhoni and Suresh Raina will now be devising strategies as rival captains. Both have admitted that playing in a jersey other than ‘yellow’ has been very “emotional” but have promised to give their all for their new teams. The Dhoni-led Pune Supergiants were very convincing and dominant when they handed defending champions Mumbai Indians a nine-wicket drubbing. They did not even require their middle order, packed with Dhoni himself and players such as Steven Smith, to come out with top-order delivering it for them
comfortably. The Lions though needed a proper team effort in taming Kings XI Punjab, who batted well but were pretty ordinary when they bowled. Aaron Finch was in good touch but the wayward Punjab bowlers only made his job easy. The big positive for the Lions was the heart showed by the young Ishan Kishan. The Under-19 Indian captain played with a lot of gumption and his confident flick off Mitchell Johnson was a proof of that. Dwayne Bravo continued his impressive form in T20s as he became the only IPL player to have a combo of 1000 runs and 100 wickets.
Overall, the Lions look like a good package but they will be tested by the Supergiants, who are looking the most formidable outfit. RP Singh with Mitchell Marsh will test their batsmen together along with quality spinners such as R. Ashwin and M. Ashwin. But it will be interesting to see if Dhoni continues to underbowl R. Ashwin or lets him complete his full quota of overs. Rising Pune Supergiants: MS Dhoni (Captain), Ajinkya Rahane, Kevin Pietersen, Faf du Plessis, Steve Smith, Mitchell Marsh, Jaskaran Singh, Ravichandran Ashwin, Ankit Sharma, Albie Morkel, Irfan Pathan, Ishant Sharma, Ishwar Pandey, Thisara Perera, Saurabh Tiwary, R P Singh, Rajat Bhatia, Ankush Bains, Baba Aparajith, Murugan Ashwin, Ashok Dinda, Deepak Chahar, Scott Boland, Peter Handscomb, Adam Zampa. Gujarat Lions: Suresh Raina (Captain), Dwayne Bravo, James Faulkner, Aaron Finch, Brendon McCullum, Dwayne Smith, Dale Steyn, Pravin Tambe, Ishan Kishan, Ravindra Jadeja, Shadab Jakati, Dinesh Karthik, Shivil Kaushik, Dhawal Kulkarni, Praveen Kumar, Pradeep Sangwan, Jaydev Shah, Umang Sharma, Andrew Tye, Sarabjit Ladda, Akshdeep Nath, Amit Mishra, Paras Dogra, Eklavya Dwivedi. — PTI
IPL
Kohli’s consistency, adaptability ‘is phenomenal’ BENGALURU: Indian batting legend V.V.S. Laxman heaped praise on star batsman Virat Kohli for his consistency in T20s and termed his adaptability to any situation “phenomenal”. Kohli, skipper of Indian Premier League (IPL) side Royal Challengers Bangalore, struck a quickfire 75 alongside A.B. De Villiers’ 82 which steered his team to a 45-run win over Sunrisers Hyderabad at the M. Chinnaswamy Stadium here on Tuesday. Kohli came into the cash-rich league after emerging as player of the tournament in the recent World T20. “It was magic. It is amazing to see the way Virat continues to score so consistently for whichever team he plays and whatever position he bats at. It is great to see the kind of level he has taken his T20 batting to; he is one of the most exciting batsmen in world
Virat Kohli.
cricket. His consistency and adaptability is phenomenal,” Laxman, mentor of Hyderabad, was quoted as saying by iplt20.com on Wednesday. The 41-year-old praised RCB’s strong batting line-up comprising Chris Gayle, Kohli, De Villiers, Shane Watson followed by promising youngsters Sarfaraz Khan,
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Kedav Jadav, Stuart Binny. “From RCB’s point of view it was good to see AB de Villiers perform like that. He didn’t have a great World Twenty20 and he must be disappointed that South Africa, despite being one of the strongest teams in the tournament, didn’t qualify for the knockout stage,” he said. “I am sure he wants to make it count in this IPL and this was a great start for him. That is one power-packed batting order that RCB have with Gayle, Virat and AB in top-three and Watson coming in as well. Now they also have Stuart Binny, Sarfaraz and Kedar Jadhav, which make their line-up very formidable,” he said. Bangalore’s 18-year-old Sarfaraz Khan (35 off 10 balls) played a cameo at the end to help his team cross the 220-run mark. “I am very impressed with him (Sarfaraz). He is a young boy but
the kind of confidence he shows and his body language is really good to see. It bodes very well for Indian cricket to see such youngsters do well against international bowlers at this level. Some of the shots that he played were mindboggling,” the former right-handed batsman said. For Sunrisers, pacer Mustafizur Rahman was the most economical bowler with figures of 2/26. Laxman praised the Bangladeshi youngster. “He (Muztafizur) is one of the most exciting bowlers in world cricket. Since his international debut against India, he has made enormous progress. This is the first time I am spending some time with him and I can see that he has got a lot of confidence in his skills. He has a lot of variations and he knows when to use them. His work ethic is fantastic,” Laxman concluded. - IANS
C O M M E N TA RY
BPL of IPL — how the line divides Kohli and Warner
I
f a man is known by the company he keeps, Royal Challengers Bangalore skipper Virat Kohli is incredibly blessed with the plush in the word. The guys he could hang out with for nearly two months are worshipped around the world for the extraordinary things they could conjure up on a cricket ground. But the unpleasant truth sticks out. Despite having fabulous blokes together in the dressing room, the RCB failed to make the playoff in 2014 and in 2015, after finishing third on the points table, got knocked out in the qualifier. Such uninspiring history of the past two disappointing seasons looks set to vanish this time around. The splendid first act scripted by Kohli and AB de Villiers for which youngster Sarfraz Khan delivered the spicy punch hints at fresh, spunky Royal entertainment set to gather momentum as it gets going in the coming days and climaxes on May 29 at the Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai with a brave new history to celebrate for the fans of the Bangalore team as such and the true lovers of the shorter format of the game as a whole. It’s exciting to think about the prospect of the Tuesday show getting repeated. With Kohli and ABD enjoying being together out in the middle, Chris Gayle looking to make amends, Shane Watson happily finding his feet in the new dugout and short and stocky boy amid giants sending out buddy-goody vibes all around, season nine could be a long, loud celebration for the RCB fans, from start to finish. If Kohli is upbeat about the company he keeps and finds himself enviably posh and delightfully above the line of poverty, Sunrisers skipper David Warner stands deep below the line of poverty (BPL), obviously disgusted with the mates he chose to swing with. One of the first few things for the Sunrisers to get right to chase a target of 228 was a good start. That meant Warner and Shikhar Dhawan should take the fight to the opposition and give the rivals a scare. While Warner played his part to perfection, Dhawan lacked all that required to play the role. What Warner needed as he tore into the RCB attack was more than
moral support from his partner, but Dhawan seemed happy taking singles, leaving it to his skipper to do the dirty, daring job. Rotating the strike is fine, but it is when both batsmen rotate hitting the big runs, chases, like the one the Sunrisers were up against at M Chinnaswamy stadium, looks possible. Dhawan, at the moment, seems to have forgotten who he really was. The competition for the RCB came from within, and that was the best part of the day for the noisy Kohli-ABD fans who thronged the stadium. The loss of Gayle in the second over when the score was just 6 would have put spokes in the RCB wheels—unless the man at the crease was Kohli and the guy who joined him was ABD. ABD was in his mettle soon, hitting Ashish Nehra for two fours and a six in the fourth over, which set the tone of the feast on offer. The South African raced past the 25 runs mark in the next over, inspiring Kohli to catch up with. From then on it was a game of one racing ahead and the other catching up with, and the roles reversed frequently to spice things up for the players and the fans in an amazing display of batting together. ABD reached 50 with a four off Ashish Reddy in the 11th over, and celebrated it smashing the next ball to the long-on rope. Kohli marked his half century with a six over long-on in the 13th over, and by the end of the next over, 14th, both were level at 68. That was surely, as ABD put it at the end of the match, “a nice, busy innings with Virat”. With Mitchell Starc unavailable owing to ankle surgery, the RCB look a bit vulnerable in the bowling department. But if the top four — Gayle, Kohli, ABD and Watson — get in gear, and Sarfraz steps on the pedal in the death overs, there’s no doubt about a place in the playoff for RCB. The writer is a freelance contributor based in India. All the views and opinions expressed in the article are solely those of the author and do not reflect those of Times of Oman