Former Indian opener Aakash Chopra took a slight dig on Sunrisers Hyderabad over their heavy loss against Lucknow Super Giants stating them as “paper tigers”. The 2016 Champions assembled a strong squad for IPL 2023 but failed to prove their worth in the first two games.
Cricketer-turned-commentator Aakash Chopra passed his verdict on the match between Sunrisers Hyderabad and Lucknow Super Giants. Chopra feels Sunrisers Hyderabad have a very good team on paper but failed to put their performance in the field.
“It was a low-scoring match and an extremely one-sided encounter in the end. Hyderabad has been handed their second defeat in as many games. The team was looking good on paper but are they paper tigers?” Aakash Chopra said.
The 45-year-old reckons that the Lucknow pitch was not suitable for T20 as the ball was kept low for the power play of the 1st innings and added that LSG’s spinners bowled well to restrict the visiting sides for 121-8 at the end of the 20 overs.
“The pitch was not worthy of a T20, let’s be honest. Spinners dominated right from the start till the end. Hyderabad won the toss and opted to bat but they couldn’t bat. They were trying to run but it was difficult to walk there. So how will you run?” Chopra added.
Sunrisers Hyderabad had a poor start with the bat as they were 55-4 at end of the 9 overs before Rahul Tripathi and Washington Sundar stitched a damaging controlling partnership to take their fighting total. But Lucknow Super Giants batted very well in the 2nd innings to take the chase down within 16 overs.
The Bowling Order Was Slightly Beyond My Understanding – Aakash Chopra
Aakash Chopra was baffled by the Sunrisers Hyderabad strategy to use in the spin in the Lucknow Pitch as they bowled only 6 overs of spin in their 16 overs with their off-spinner Washington Sundar bowling only 1 over in the match, whereas Lucknow Super Giants bowled 13 overs of spin in their innings.
“I thought we will see a lot of spin in the run chase, that Washington Sundar will come from one end, then Aiden Markram and Adil Rashid, but we didn’t see spin at the start. The bowling order was slightly beyond my understanding,” Aakash Chopra said.
Sunrisers Hyderabad will take on Punjab Kings in their third game as they will look to register their first win in the league stage, on the other hand, Shikhar Dhawan-led side to coming off fine form win their first two matches and they will be boosted by the arrival of their star pacer Kagiso Rabada for this encounter.