Sunrisers Hyderabad won the toss and decided bowl to first at Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad. The home captain David Warner did not tinker with the winning combination and made no changes to the side, whereas, there were two changes in Gujarat Lions line-up, as Delhi’s leg-spinner Tejas Baroka and Kerala’s Basil Thampi replaced Shadab Jakati and Manpreet Gony.
Baroka, who is yet to make his list A and the first-class debut is former Delhi Under 19 player, who was picked up by the Gujarat-based franchise for his base price of 10 Lakh in the auction. On the other hand, Thampi drew an amount of 85 Lakhs on the auction day.
He impressed everyone with his pace in the Syed Mushtaq Ali Trophy, which was televised. Both the youngsters have big shoes to fill and the franchise will be hoping to reap benefits out of them.
Sunrisers Hyderabad is coming afresh with a win over Royal Challengers Bangalore, whereas, Gujarat Lions suffered a surprising defeat at the hands of Kolkata Knight Riders by a margin of 10 wickets. So, the home side has the psychological advantage, a factor on which they would like to cash upon.
Here is what both the captains said at the toss –
Raina:
‘We would have bowled first as well. The pitch looks good and we will look to post a good score on the board. Two changes for us. Manpreet Gony and Shadab Jakati miss out, Tejas Baroka, the leg-spinner, and Basil Thampi, the Kerala pacer, will make their IPL debuts.’
Warner:
‘We will bowl first. We are playing a second time in two days on this pitch, it might get better under lights. Confident about our abilities, we need to go out and execute our skills. No changes in our playing XI.’
Here is playing XI of Sunrisers Hyderabad –
Gujarat Lions Playing XI: Jason Roy, Brendon McCullum, Suresh Raina(c), Aaron Finch, Dinesh Karthik(w), Dwayne Smith, Praveen Kumar, Basil Thampi, Tejas Baroka, Dhawal Kulkarni, Shivil Koushik.