This is a contest between a team that would like to
believe it has turned a corner and another that seemed to have turned a
corner, before it was rather rudely pulled back. They are also
traditionally strong IPL sides: Delhi Daredevils and Deccan Chargers
have both made two semi-finals each, and Deccan have won once. The
auction has left them unsettled though. Delhi have lost many players,
including the likes of Gautam Gambhir, Daniel Vettori and Dirk Nannes.
Deccan have lost their captain and father figure, Adam Gilchrist, and
big players like Andrew Symonds and Rohit Sharma. The replacements are
there, and they come with reputations, but are yet to settle in and
compensate for the losses.
Deccan shrugged off a slow start by beating
Royal Challengers Bangalore, but Gilchrist and his Kings XI Punjab ran
all over them in the fourth game to leave them with just one win from
four matches. Delhi had a similar start to their campaign before they
finally won in their third attempt, chasing down 188 against Pune
Warriors in Mumbai.
It is still early days in the tournament -
every team plays 14 games in the league stages - but three losses (a
number already achieved by Deccan and one loss away for Delhi) will call
for a huge effort coming back when teams know they need something in
the region of nine to ten wins to make it to the play-offs.
Team talk
Delhi came together as a team - for the first
time this season, as captain Virender Sehwag remarked - in the win
against Pune. Except for Tasmanian Matthew Wade, who seemed to struggle
against spin in his first game, and wasn't even used as a wicketkeeper.
Roelof van der Merwe could come back into the side.
Deccan will want to bring back Pragyan Ojha in
place of Manpreet Gony, especially at the Feroz Shah Kotla, which has a
reputation for being a slow wicket. Also worth considering will be
including Cameron White ahead of JP Duminy.
Predict the playing XIs for this match. Play ESPNcricinfo Team selector.
In the spotlight
Virender Sehwag is yet to play a Sehwag-like
knock this season. He has had two starts, but will want to make a
decisive contribution soon.
Amit Mishra learned all his cricket in Delhi,
but because of selectorial neglect had to move to Haryana to play
first-class cricket. Now after three successful seasons with the Delhi
IPL team, he finds himself out again, and up against what should have
been his home team at what should have been his home ground.
Prime numbers
In his previous game, Sehwag became the 12th batsman to have scored 1000 IPL runs.
Pragyan Ojha, with 50 wickets, is one behind all-time leading wicket-taker in IPL, RP Singh.
The chatter
"If you have a couple of players [retained
from the previous season's squad] you can build the new team around
them, with just one old player [Sehwag] that's difficult, but we are
getting there. A couple of more wins and we should be there."
Virender Sehwag
0 comments:
Post a Comment