After Sunrisers Hyderabad clinched the second spot in IPL 2024 points table with a successful chase of 215 against Punjab Kings, head coach Daniel Vettori lauded batters Abhishek Sharma and Rahul Tripathi for laying the foundation of the victory through their attacking batting in the power-play.
After Travis Head fell for a golden duck, Abhishek and Rahul hit 66 off 28 balls and 33 off 18 deliveries respectively, as SRH ended the power-play at 84/2. The scoring rate for SRH never slowed down and Heinrich Klaasen, through his 42 off 26 balls, along with Nitish Kumar Reddy making 37 off 25 deliveries later propelled SRH to complete the chase with five balls to spare.
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“Special mention for those two around, as no matter what the situation is, we expect that positive play from the batters. Abhishek and Rahul in particular took the game on to basically win the powerplay and that is how we have won most of our games, and again that was exceptional.
“Heady and Abhi have done it a lot of times, but for Abhi and Rahul to do it, it was exceptional. Then to hand over to Klassen and Nitish – to put a performance together and chase those big scores – it feels like they happened a lot, but they actually don’t. You have to play exceptionally well to chase those big scores,” said Vettori in a video posted by the franchise on Monday.
For SRH, left-arm pacer T Natarajan was the standout bowler with his figures of 2-33. “Great blowout after sort of 10 days off to come together against a team that was still ready to perform.”
“We were obviously a little rusty with the ball at the start but to fight back in the last 4 overs was incredible in this scenario. So I think there was that ability to assess as we went along and get the job done in the last little bit with the ball, and it allowed us to hand over to the batting group, Abhi and Rahul,” added Vettori.
SRH will now play the Qualifier 1 against table-toppers Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in Ahmedabad on Tuesday, with an eye to grab their second IPL title after 2016. “All those times, when we felt a little bit of pressure, guys took the positive option. To reiterate that, going into the playoffs is key.”
“So nothing changes when we go into the playoffs. Take the game on, play exactly the same and stay consistent and true to our methods, so, well done boys,” concluded Vettori.
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