IPL 2020 | SRH vs KKR - Lockie Ferguson's burst sends Sunrisers packing

It seemed like both the sides didn’t mind taking the game to a Super Over when Andre Russell jogged into bowl a good length delivery which hit David Warner’s back leg as they cramped for a single to take their score to 163/6. The batters didn’t make an effort to steal a second run and on the other hand, none of the KKR players made an appeal for an LBW.

Eoin Morgan went for his go-to-bowler as Lockie Ferguson stepped up to cap off a good game with two wickets in the Super Over. The Kiwi pacer rattled Warner’s furniture before shooting out a leg-cutter to end Abdul Samad’s stay. Chasing 3 runs, Dinesh Karthik and Eoin Morgan did the job to get to 10 points.

Demoted to lower order on the day, David Warner hit an unbeaten 47* off 33 balls, courtesy five fours, helping Sunrisers Hyderabad fight back in the chase after a fired-up Ferguson created early in-roads. The pacer picked the wicket of big fish Kane Williamson and sent back Priyam Garg and Manish Pandey to hurt Hyderabad’s innings.

Spinner Kuldeep Yadav looked sharp as well. He beat the opposition batters in flight and turned out to be quite economical. The Hyderabad batters did get starts but none of them converted it to a big score. The decision to demote warner in the batting order nearly came off but the side will have to work on their batting in order to make a bid for a playoff berth

Vijay Shankar earns rich rewards, DK, Morgan provide the finishing touch

The wicket at Abu Dhabi was slowish and it was tough for KKR batters to switch gears. Opener Shubman Gill struggled to press on the accelerator once again as he made a 37-ball 36. The youngster has scored just 89 runs off 95 balls against fast bowlers this season - every time the ball was bowled outside off stump.

The slow start resulted in the promotion of Andre Russell, who was yet to fire with the bat. The Jamaican looked restless at the crease and his brief appearance came to an end when Vijay Shankar took a catch at the boundary to give T Natarajan his second scalp of the game.

Shankar had an impressive outing with the ball. He made good use of the conditions and kept the batters in check with tidy lines. He bagged the wicket of Nitish Rana (29 off 20) and completed his quota of four overs for the first time in his IPL career.

The Knight Riders desperately needed big overs and in came Dinesh Karthik, who stitched an unbeaten 58-run stand off 22 balls in the company of newly appointed skipper Eoin Morgan. Karthik looked in good flow and took the attack to the opposition. He hammered boundaries at will and executed the sweep shot to perfection to fetch a maximum off Sandeep Sharma’s over. Morgan picked 16 runs in the last over to give KKR a competitive total.

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IPL 2020 | CSK vs RR: Match Preview, Predicted XI & Dream11 Fantasy Picks

Two sides on the brink of being knocked out of the 13th edition of the Indian Premier League will see off against each other in the match 37. The Chennai Super Kings have played in the shadow of their past and not been able to get their tactics right while the Rajasthan Royals never found their groove in the annoying season. However, the same can be said about Super Kings as well as the MS Dhoni-led side has looked toothless and badly out of depth in pressure situations. The team has struggled to get going in the mandatory power play while batting whereas the bowlers have leaked far too many runs in the back end of the innings. The Super Kings have not been able to find an opening partnership that can start the innings on a rapid note and at the same time sluggish batting approach in the middle overs by batsmen such as MS Dhoni, Kedar Jadhav has left a lot to be desired from the batting side which prides itself on bringing their best in tough situations. Now the separated pair of Faf du Plessis and Shane Watson have caught Dhoni in the middle of a big dilemma. Shane Watson now bats at the number three position and with the role Sam Curran has been assigned to do for the side, both he and du Plessis assemble together very early in the innings. The duo has found it tough to hit boundaries at will like the way they used to do in their early career and that puts pressure on the middle and lower-order batsmen to score heavily in the last over. This gameplan used to work for the team when MS Dhoni was in his prime and was punishing bowlers at will. But that strategy is now a double-edged sword and the team has found itself in the muddle created by a conservative approach by du Plessis and Watson but their wickets have also been proven critical as the batsmen batting lower down the order have struggled to score big, leave alone at a rapid rate. MS Dhoni would be hoping his team will show character, a legacy he has built with the CSK as the team is now staring at the door of being knocked out losing 6 matches out of the nine matches played this season. On the other hand, the Rajasthan Royals have suffered from a lack of consistency and clarity in the team planning and Steve Smith has shown the temperament of a rookie captain and has batted well opposite to his reputation in the world cricket. He has not been able to anchor the Royals batting. The team has come up with bizarre team selection and batting order and the team has erred a lot on the basics of the game. The management has slotted all the star batsmen at the top of the order with the idea of maximising as much of their potential as possible but facts are evidence that the strategy is ailing the team and young players such as Rahul Tewatia and Riyan Parag have been able to save the day for the team while batting very lower down the order. Both these teams have similar points from the same number of games in the season and are placed one above the other. MS Dhoni will bank on players to win at least four out of the next five games and keep the history of making the playoffs every season intact while Steve Smith will be asking tough questions to himself and his teammates in search of quick turnaround before it becomes too late in the season. Chennai Super Kings vs Rajasthan Royals: Match details Match Number- 37 Date: 19th October 2020, at 7:30 PM IST, 06:00 PM Local, 2.00 PM GMT Venue: Abu Dhabi Broadcast: Star Sports and Hotstar Pitch and weather The same pitch that was used in the day game between the Sunrisers Hyderabad and the Kolkata Knight Riders will be used for this match as well and it is highly likely that spinners will be in the game. Balls were holding up in the pitch in that game and if deteriorates further to assist spinners, MS Dhoni can rely on the duo of Ravindra Jadeja and Karn Sharma to shine and get the Kings back on winning ways. The temperature in Abu Dhabi on the match night is expected to hit the lower range of 25 degrees and added with winds across the ground, the players will cherish playing T-20 cricket on Monday night. Team News Chennai Super Kings The kind of performances the Chennai Super Kings have seen so far this season, captain MS Dhoni would have loved to have options to bring changes in the playing XI but he has to take a fair share of the blame for the lack of options on the CSK’s bench as the team did not seek any replacement for Suresh Raina and Harbhajan Singh before the tournament began. Dwayne Bravo went out of the field before the last over and Dhoni had to go to Jadeja to save 17 runs in the last over and it is unlikely that Bravo will be able to make it into the playing XI for the match between CSK and RR. This however will open the gate for either Lungi Ngidi or Josh Hazlewood and the team needs a genuine pacer to bring an x-factor in the bowling line up which has looked placid at best so far in the season. Expected XI Faf du Plessis, Shane Watson, Ambati Rayudu, MS Dhoni (c & wk), Kedar Jadhav, Ravindra Jadeja, Sam Curran, Josh Hazlewood, Deepak Chahar, Shardul Thakur, Karn Sharma Rajasthan Royals Rajasthan Royals are unlikely to change their batting but Jaydev Unadkat is all set to be axed for the horrible over he bowled in the penultimate over of the match against RCB. This may provide Varun Aaron with a fresh opportunity to impress the side after an expensive couple of overs he was asked to bowl in the solitary match he played this season. The team will bank on the overseas players to turn the season around for them. Jos Buttler and Ben Stokes need to find their mojo back as quickly as possible and Steve Smith looked settled as a batsman in the last game and would be hopeful of retaining his form for a longer period of time this time around. Expected XI Ben Stokes, Jos Buttler, Steven Smith (c), Sanju Samson (wk), Robin Uthappa, Riyan Parag, Rahul Tewatia, Jofra Archer, Shreyas Gopal, Varun Aaron, Kartik Tyagi Chennai Super Kings vs Rajasthan Royals: Dream 11 team and suggestions Sanju Samson, Jos Buttler, Faf du Plessis, Ambati Rayudu, Riyan Parag, Sam Curran, Ravindra Jadeja, Shardul Thakur, Deepak Chahar, Karn Sharma, Jofra Archer Captain: Sam Curran Vice-captain: Jos Buttler

IPL 2020: From ‘Tewatia Kuch bhi kar sakte hain’ to ‘Dhai Axar Prem ke’ Virender Sehwag's weird congratulatory messages go viral

In a day full of surprises and thrilling encounters, former India cricketer Virender Sehwag, in an attempt to be funny with his tweets, put out some weird congratulatory messages for Indian cricketers. Tweeting about the brilliant fielding of Rahul Tewatia, Rajasthan Royals’ new finishing, who got RCB captain Virat Kohli out with a sensational catch on the boundary lines at Dubai International Stadium, Sehwag said, “Tewatia kuchh bhi kar sakte hain. Agar Covid vaccine banane ka ek mauka mil gaya, toh jaisa unka time chal raha hai , lagta hai bana denge. What a season for him. #RRvRCB” Later in the second game of the day played in Sharjah, Axar Patel played a bizarre inning as he hit three sixes off Ravindra Jadeja to win his team Delhi Capitals a game in which they required 17 off the last over. The game was against Chennai Super Kings, whose captain MS Dhoni had one hit four sixes of Patel’s last over to win a game for Rising Pune Supergiants. Praising Axar, Sehwag wrote, “Dhai Axar Prem ke.” He then went on to appreciate Shikhar Dhawan as well. “Wonderful hundred from @SDhawan25 but Axar Patel doing to Dhoni's team what was done to him by Dhoni 4 years ago. But a much better batting performance from CSK. #DCvCSK,” he wrote.

IPL 2020: Sunil Narine cleared off suspect action by IPL committee

The main man of Kolkata Knight Riders’ bowling department, Sunil Narine has been cleared off the suspect action by the Suspect Bowling Action Committee of the IPL. He has also been taken off the warning list by the committee. Rahul Dravid, ICC match referee Javagal Srinath, former ICC umpire K Hariharan and BCCI treasurer Arun Dhumal form the prestigious committee. Responding to KKR’s official request for an assessment of Narine, the Committee in a statement said, "KKR requested for an official assessment of Mr. Narine's action from the IPL Suspect Bowling Action Committee, submitting action footage in slow motion with back and side angles." “The Committee carefully reviewed all the deliveries of action footage sent of Mr. Narine with the naked eye and has come to the conclusion that the elbow-bend appears to be within the range of permissible limits," it added in the release. Narine was reported for the suspect action by the on-field umpires Ulhas Gandhe and Chris Gaffaney during the KKR’s match against Kings XI Punjab on October 10. Narine has been earlier reported for the suspect action during the 2014 Champions League T20 and was subsequently banned from bowling off-breaks. Since then he worked with his personal spin coach Carl Crowe. Saying that the committee would keep an eye on Narine, the release said, "The Committee also noted that Mr. Narine should reproduce the same action going forward in the IPL 2020 matches as presented to the Committee in the video footage.”

Report: Kolkata Knight Riders likely to replace injured Ali Khan with Tim Seifert

USA pacer Ali Khan’s Indian Premier League stint has ended without a game due to a side-strain which he was carrying since the Caribbean Premier League. Khan was roped in by Kolkata Knight Riders as a replacement for England fast bowler Harry Gurney, who didn’t take part in the tournament due to scheduled shoulder surgery. The KKR camp always maintained that Khan was recovering well and even trained with the rest of the team. KKR’s chief executive Venky Mysore had said that he was optimistic about Khan’s recovery. "While we are disappointed that he injured himself, KKR always does everything to take care of its players and therefore have asked him to stay on and are helping him with his recovery and rehab. Hopefully, he will recover fast," Mysore told ESPNcricinfo. According to a report by the same media house, New Zealand wicket-keeper batsman Tim Seifert is set to replace the injured pacer. The Kiwi is a white-ball specialist, who has represented Blackcaps in three ODIs and 24 T20Is. Seifert had an ordinary CPL, where he made 133 runs in nine innings at a strike rate of 109.91 Kolkata is currently at the fourth spot with eight points from as many games. Recently, Dinesh Karthik and Eoin Morgan ‘swapped roles’, which meant Morgan would be leading the pack in the remainder of the IPL season. His captaincy stint got off to a poor start as the side faced a heavy defeat in the hands of Mumbai Indians.