RCB aim to continue revival against SRH
BANGALORE: In what will be the final game of the IPL 2018 season at the M Chinnaswamy Stadium, table-toppers Sunrisers Hyderabad will take on Royal Challengers Bangalore, who are hanging by a thread, here on Thursday.
Safely through to Qualifier 1 after being assured of a top-2 finish, Sunrisers Hyderabad have been the team of the tournament so far. In a tournament where the captain winning the toss invariably opts to field, the Kane Williamson-led outfit has managed to defend totals four times. This is apart from winning five games while chasing. However, though they won five games on the trot, they went down to CSK in Pune in the last game on Sunday.
The hosts, on the other hand, are languishing at the seventh spot with only Delhi Daredevils below them. They need a win desperately to keep themselves in contention for playoffs and have to win their last two games to have any chance of making it to the last week of IPL 2018.
Though they have lost seven of their 12 matches yet, the momentum is with Royal Challengers following successive victories in their last two outings.
While defending is Sunrisers’ speciality, batting second comes naturally to ‘chase master’ Virat Kohli, whose team has won four of its games while chasing.
Both the skippers, Kohli and Williamson, have done exceptionally well and have expectedly been the best batsmen of their teams. Both are the only ones from their squads to have scored more than 500 runs this season.
Sunrisers Hyderabad possess quite a potent bowling line-up which many would argue is the best among all eight teams.