IPL 2020 | RCB vs CSK: Hits and Flops as Gaikwad guides Chennai to an easy win

Chennai Super Kings and their fans finally had something to cheer about as the yellow brigade tamed Virat Kohli’s Royal Challengers Bangalore by 8 wickets at the Dubai International Stadium. Everything finally fell into place as the youngster in Ruturaj Gaikwad finally showed some spark in batting, taking the MS Dhoni-led team home.

Forced to field first, Chennai did well with their pacers Sam Curran and Deepak Chahar and fresh spin inclusion Mitchell Santner to stop the Challengers at a modest 145. After that, the resolve and intent were seen right from the start in the batting as well, when opener Gaikwad made well-combined partnerships with Faf du Plessis and Ambati Rayudu and later on with skipper Dhoni to seal the game.

There were many that contributed to the victory for CSK and many that did not perform as per expectation for the RCB. To know them and their batting performances better, here is the list of hits and flops from the game.

Hits

#1 Ruturaj Gaikwad

Before the start of the tournament, Gaikwad was primed to be the successor of Suresh Raina in the team. However, situations did not help in the initial phase as he tested positive for the covid-19 and later when he got the opportunities, wasn’t given the top spot, which he usually bats at for his team Maharashtra.

Given a chance to open the innings, he finally made it count in the second attempt, scoring a match-winning 65 off 51 and more importantly carried his bat. In his innings, Gaikwad had three good partnerships alongside experienced players like du Plessis, Ambati Rayudu, and Dhoni. He hit four boundaries three sixes in the innings.

#2 Sam Curran

The player, who has been performing for the Daddies’ Army even with others faltering, performed today as well. The Englishman picked three crucial wickets including that of opponent skipper Virat Kohli and Aaron Finch. His spell at the beginning turned out to be an important one as he did not allow RCB to build momentum. The left-arm bowler, who had till now picked 10 wickets in the IPL, added three more to the tally today as he finished with the figures of 3/19.

#3 Deepak Chahar

Not being able to contribute much with the ball in the last few games, Chahar, who primarily was bowled out at the start of the inning was given a chance to bowl in the death and he responded brilliantly by picking up two wickets and that too of two of the danger men, AB de Villiers and Chris Morris.

The wicket of de Villiers in particular was the game-changing one for CSK as it brought the RCB total down by 30-35 runs.

Flops

#1 Aaron Finch

This IPL has not gone the way Australian limited-overs captain Aaron Finch would have wanted. Apart from two innings- one 47 off 37 against KKR and 52 of 35 against Mumbai Indians, Finch has not been able to contribute greatly to the RCB cause.

Even today, he did not look his best and was thus removed by Sam Curran early on in the RCB innings at just 15 off 11 balls.

#2 Moeen Ali

Moeen Ali was given a chance in place of Isuru Udana but he failed to impress anybody getting out for just one in the 18^th over, where people expected him to go berserk. Ali couldn't do much with the ball in hand either.

This might just turn out to be the last game of the IPL for Ali as Udana world be preferred in his place.

While Chennai have nothing more to achieve rather than the lost respect, but RCB would look to tighten the nuts moving forward in the tournament.

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IPL 2020 | KKR vs KXIP: Match Preview, Predicted XI & Dream11 Fantasy Picks

After impacting each other’s journey in the ongoing season of the Indian Premier League with very wins and losses, two teams vying for one spot in the top four-- the Kings XI Punjab and the Kolkata Knight Riders will lock horns to push the other away from the race directly by defeating in a one-on-one contest. Both sides have a spring in their step after energetic and soul-searching wins in their last games. The KKR trounced the Delhi Capitals in their last game on the back of performances reminiscent of the franchise’s past while the KL Rahul’s KXIP’s resurgence has taken the IPL to a storm. The Kings XI Punjab got their mojo back in their win against the Mumbai Indians in the match that went down to two super overs and the side has never looked back since defeating the Delhi Capitals handsomely in the next match and followed it up with a spectacular win against the Sunrisers when all looked doomed and gloomy for the Mohali-based side. The team has managed to win on the back of players other than match-winning contributions from the captain KL Rahul and Mayank Agarwal would give a leap of confidence to the side. Nicholas Pooran has shown the form he was trusted to display in the tournament by the side and now the Kings XI are riding high on belief and self-confidence after winning games from behind in the last few games. On the other hand, the Kolkata Knight Riders proved that the side house=s too much of class to put on dismal batting performances for a long period of time and the Delhi Capitals turned out to be on the wrong side of their firepower. The last win against the Capitals was achieved courtesy two seasoned pros in Sunil Narine, Nitish Rana and a rising star Varun Chakravarthy. The side turned back the clock and showed all the quality of it used to show in its prime days in the history of the league. The KXIP have won five matches while the KKR have 12 points from six wins after playing an equal number of matches at 11. The encounter between the side could well be a one knockout clash where the ascendancy of one over another will push the side on the wrong side of the result on the brink of the playoff chances in the season. Eoin Morgan would be hopeful of consistency from his side and will expect his men to carry on with the self-belief and momentum they would have gained after such a big win over the Capitals while KL Rahul would keep reminding his men that the journey is not finished yet and one bad game would undo all the hard work and hard-earned success of the last four games. The game will be also bee a matchup between the bowling lineup of the KKR which has the raw pace of Lockie Ferguson and Pat Cummins along with the guile and surprises of Varun Chakravarthy and the star-studded lineup of the Kings XI filled with explosive batsmen such as KL Rahul, Mayank Agarwal, Chris Gayle and Nicholas Poooran. The KKR bowling lineup is in top-notch form and so are the KXIP batsmen and it would make up for a riveting contest to start afresh week in the IPL 2020. Kolkata Knight Riders vs Kings XI Punjab- Match details Match Number - 46 Date: 25th October 2020, at 7:30 PM IST Venue: Sharjah Pitch and Weather An old pitch that was used in the game between the Mumbai Indians and the Chennai Super Kings will be used again for this match and it might bring spinners into the game. The pair of Trent Boult and Jasprit Bumrah found help from the pitch and Boult also got a considerable amount of movement in the air to torment the CSK’s top order and the bowling attack on either side will look to extract same purchase as Boult and Bumrah got in the last game on this pitch. The par score at the Sharjah cricket ground has decreased considerably after the first few games when batsmen were making merry off the bowlers due to extremely short boundaries and the sides will look to reboot their batting tactics keeping in mind the size of the boundary in Sharjah. The weather in Sharjah is likely to be pleasant for the players with the temperature dipping below the 30 degree-mark and expected level of humidity around 50 per cent. Team News Kolkata Knight Riders Eoin Morgan had credited Brendon McCullum for bringing back Sunil Narine into the playing XI and the team did not give any reasons whatsoever to make Morgan and McCullum ponder over the makeup of the playing XI. However, it is more than likely that the KKR will maintain a fluid batting order where batsmen will be picked to bat at different positions based on situations in a particular game. Expected XI Shubman Gill, Nitish Rana, Rahul Tripathi, Eoin Morgan (c), Dinesh Karthik (wk), Sunil Narine, Pat Cummins, Lockie Ferguson, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Prasidh Krishna, Varun Chakravarthy Kings XI Punjab Mayank Agarwal missed the last game due to an injury he had picked up in the game against the Delhi Capitals but his injury did not look serious at that time. Although there is lack of clarity on the nature of his injury, he is likely to walk back into the XI against the KKR. The rest of the team should be as it was in the last game except for any injury concerns in the 11th hour. Expected XI KL Rahul (c & wk), Mayank Agarwal, Chris Gayle, Nicholas Pooran, Glenn Maxwell, Deepak Hooda, Murugan Ashwin, Chris Jordan, Mohammed Shami, Ravi Bishnoi, Arshdeep Singh Kolkata Knight Riders vs Kings XI Punjab: Dream 11 team and suggestion Dinesh Karthik, Nicholas Pooran, KL Rahul, Rahul Tripathi, Nitish Rana, Eoin Morgan, Mayank Agarwal, Sunil Narine, Lockie Ferguson, Chris Jordan, Mohammed Shami Captain: KL Rahul Vice-captain: Nicholas Pooran

IPL 2020: David Warner confident of SRH making it to playoffs

The captain of the Sunrisers Hyderabad David Warner has expressed confidence over his side to win the next three fixtures and keep the hopes for playoff birth alive. But, the men in orange have a monumental task at their hands as they are slated to clash with the top three teams of the IPL 2020 such as the Mumbai Indians, Royal Challengers Bangalore and the Delhi Capitals in their next three matches. However, Warner was also vocal about his disappointment on the amount of complacency shown by the batsman in the last game against the Kings XI Punjab where the team lost from a situation needing just 71 runs off 83 balls with all 10 wickets in hand. The Sunrisers have won only four matches in this season so far and will need more than winning all of their next three games with the maximum points they can reach to is 14 and they would rely on other teams to perform poorly to have any chance to secure a backdoor entry into the playoffs of the IPL 2020. The Sunrisers are placed at the number six position on the points table and will have to be at the top of their games to have any chance of competing against the sides sitting in the top three positions of the points table.

Indian Test specialists off to Dubai

The preparations for India’s tour of Australia following the IPL 2020 is underway in full swing and the test specialists such as Chetshwar Pujara and Hanuma Vihari are scheduled to reach in the United Emirates to assemble before a long list of players travel down under for full series comprising of three ODIs, three T20Is and four Tests. Both the batsmen will be joined by the all coaching support staff such as Batting coach Vikram Rathour, bowling coach Bharat Arun and the fielding coach R Sridhar on the journey to the Emirates except the head coach Ravi Shastri who is set to join the touring party a day later on October 26. What makes the travel plans intriguing is that the selection panel led by the former Indian left-arm spinner Sunil Joshi is yet to pick the squads for any series on the tour and neither has the Cricket Australia finalised any itinerary for the series. The long-awaited series between the sides will be kicking off with white-ball leg of the series followed by the Border-Gavaskar Trophy which will commence with a pink ball Test in Adelaide starting December 17. Virat Kohli had led the Indian ODIs, T20Is, and Test teams on the last tour of Australia where the men in blue had a fabulous season winning the one day series, drawing the T20 series triumphing in the Test series for the first time in the history of India’s tour to Australia.

IPL 2020 | SRH vs KXIP: Hits and Flops as Chris Jordan- Arshdeep Singh execute the biggest heist in the 13th edition of the league

You lose some games, you gift others and then there are games in which victory is just robbed off you in a perfect style- probably like a heist. And that’s exactly what happened in Dubai as the Sunrisers Hyderabad were robbed of a victory by the two Punjabi pace bowlers, Chris Jordan and Arshdeep Singh. Kings XI defended the lowest total of the season- 126 runs as they got their opponents all out for 114, who at one time were 100/3 in the 17th over. The roles played by the Punjabi players vary, however the ones played by the Hyderabad batsmen, who came after the fall of openers David Warner and Jonny Bairstow have no variation at all, as all of them were moronically dismissed of length balls, trying to play glory shots. On that note, here is a look at the Hits and Flops of the game Hits #1 Chris Jordan Getting an inspiration from the game against Mumbai Indians in which he had delivered the second super over to win his team the match, Chris Jordan took it upon himself to do it again for the team. He bowled an immaculate 17th over picking the much-needed wicket of Manish Pandey and giving way just seven runs of it. But what was even more brilliant was the penultimate over that he bowled. Defending just 17 off 12 balls, Jordan bowled a perfect over, picking up the wickets of dangerous Jason Holder and Rashid Khan in consecutive deliveries and gave away just three runs off it, giving young Arshdeep an opportunity to win his team a game by defending 14 off the last over. #2 Arhsdeep Singh If Jordan was brilliant, the Sikh Swagger in Arshdeep was not behind either. He took it upon himself to win the game for the team, delivering three back to back brilliant overs, giving away just 13 runs, and picking up three crucial wickets as well, including the one of settled Vijay Shankar. His best however was seen in the last over as he refused to get bogged down by pressure and kept on bowling length deliveries that were sticking into the wicket. This performance made the belief of the team even stronger in him as he finally repaid the backing of the management. #3 Nicholas Pooran When all the batsmen of Punjab were getting out either by getting beaten by Rashid’s leggies or by the helplessness of not being able to connect the deliveries properly, there was one man, who stood till the last ball, to give Kings XI something to fight at on that bowler’s friendly wicket. Pooran made a struggling yet fruitful 32 off 28 balls to get Punjab to 126. In the hindsight, the 15 runs scored off the last two overs seem to be the most crucial in the entire Punjab innings. Flops #1 Manish Pandey The hero from the last game, Manish Pandey became the ultimate villain in this game, gobbling up deliveries and not being able to tickle the scorecard at the same time. Pandey made a painful 15 off 29 balls, which at best could be described as a horrendous attempt at chasing a small total. He along with Vijay Shankar, the other hero from the last game, used up 44 balls in the middle overs to make just 33 runs and then eventually get out when there was the needed to finally put the balls to the boundaries and win the game for the team. #2 Vijay Shankar The 3-D player as he is commonly known as, Shankar was praised in the last game a lot for his superb knock, which wasn’t really superb but an average knock in the light of many knocks played in this season of the game. However, so the superstar from the last game was yet again up for an opportunity to win yet another game for the team. But then what happened- well he failed and that too miserably. Shankar got out in the 18th over off Arshdeep trying to accelerate, which really wasn’t the need, all that was needed was of him to play till the last ball of the game and win it for the team. In total, he made 26 of 27 balls, slightly better from his partner Manish, yet not enough to lend his team a win. The next games are going to be crucial for both the teams, especially the Kings as they have a higher chance of q2ualifying for the Playoffs.