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SRH IPL 2020 Preview: How Good are the Sunrisers? | Sunrisers Hyderabad IPL 2020 Preview: Can SRH perform well in IPL 2020?
Sunrisers Hyderabad has been amongst one of the most successful sides in the past few seasons of the Indian Premier League. They won the title in 2016, were the runner-ups in 2018 and made the playoffs last season.
Their squad looks good enough to be considered as a playoffs contender in 2020, as they’ve tried to fix the issues they had last season. England’s World Cup-winning coach Trevor Bayliss is their new head coach coming into this season, and is one of the best in the business currently.
Let’s discuss the strengths and the areas where the Hyderabad franchise lacks behind the other teams. Here is the squad analysis of Sunrisers Hyderabad for IPL 2020.
Squad:
David Warner (c), Manish Pandey, Rashid Khan, Bhuvneshwar kumar, Siddarth Kaul, Shahbaz Nadeem, Vijay Shankar, Kane Williamson, Sandeep Sharma, Khaleel Ahmed, Jonny Bairstow, Mitchell Marsh, Priyam Garg, Virat Singh, Wriddhiman Saha, Mohammad Nabi, Shreevats Goswami, Basil Thampi, Abhishek Sharma, Billy Stanlake, Fabian Allen, T Natarajan, Sandeep Bavanaka, Sanjay Yadav, Abdul Samad
Watch: CricBlog caught up with Cricket with Sparsh to analyse the Sunrisers Hyderabad squad ahead of IPL 2020. Watch here.
Strengths of SRH:
1. Best Opening Pair in the Tournament
“David Warner and Jonny Bairstow will open for the Sunrisers”. This line is enough to intimidate any bowling line-up. The Aussie-English duo is the best opening pair in the tournament. David Warner is an absolute beast in the IPL – he has the most runs by any foreign player in the IPL history and fourth overall. He has won the Orange Cap thrice (2015,2017 & 2019) – the most by any player. He played only 12 games in 2019 and was the highest run-scorer with 692 runs, and can be backed to have another great season.
Jonny Bairstow, on the other hand, was one of the best buys of the last auction. 2019 was his debut IPL season, and he lit the stage with his batting, scoring 445 runs in just 10 games, with an average of 55.62 and SR of 157.24. These two are the best batters for SRH and a lot of expectations are on them to give them a flying start in the tournament.
2. Spin Attack
Sunrisers depend on their bowlers to win them the majority of the matches and they have a good bowling attack, especially in the spin department. Rashid Khan, Mohammad Nabi and Shahbaaz Nadeem bring variety to their spin attack. Abhishek Sharma and Abdul Samad can also roll their arms if required. Rashid Khan is ranked number one in ICC World T20I rankings. We all know what he can do on his day. Mohammad Nabi is also in great form in the recently concluded CPL. He picked 12 wickets in 12 games and bowled with a good economy rate. Shahbaaz Nadeem is a consistent performer in the domestic circuit.
Spinners are even more important this IPL as this time it’ll be played in the UAE, which has bigger grounds and spin-friendly surfaces. And with 60 games to be played at three venues, the pitches will be very tired in the later phase of the tournament and spinners, as mentioned, will be very crucial for any side. Hyderabad’s spin attack looks strong and is expected to do well.
3. Powerplay Bowling
Sunrisers’ powerplay bowling is one of the best amongst the eight teams. Bhuvaneshwar Kumar is a magician with that new ball. He can swing the ball both ways and is known for taking early wickets. Sandeep Sharma is another one who swings the ball and has been very effective in the powerplay in the past few seasons. Mohammad Nabi can also bowl well with the new ball as we’ve already seen in CPL 2020. It will give them an edge in the player match-ups.
Picking early wickets is very important as putting the opposition under pressure early in their innings is very helpful and SRH will be hoping to do the same with their bowling.
Weaknesses of SRH:
1. Over Dependent on Warner-Bairstow
Their biggest strength is their weakness too. Sunrisers are heavily dependent on David Warner and Jonny Bairstow for the bulk of their scoring. No one apart from Manish Pandey gives much confidence in scoring in case of a top-order collapse. Vijay Shankar hasn’t performed as consistently as SRH would’ve liked him too.
In games where Warner and Bairstow didn’t score big in 2019, SRH ended up on the losing side. This is not to suggest that they don’t have good batters other than the openers, but they have an inexperienced bunch of batters, apart from Manish Pandey and Vijay Shankar. Let’s talk about this in detail:
2. Inexperienced Middle Order
Manish Pandey was outstanding for them last season when batting at three. Vijay Shankar was inconsistent and this is where the problem begins. Assuming Kane Williamson doesn’t make the first XI, they have Virat Singh, Abhishek Sharma, Abdul Samad, and Priyam Garg as middle-order batsmen. All of them are very talented and have performed well in domestic and U19s, but are inexperienced in the IPL. In case the top 3 gets out cheaply the batting looks a bit vulnerable.
They have the likes of Mohammad Nabi, Fabian Allen, and Rashid Khan who are very capable with the bat, but they are the finishers and you don’t want your finishers to get exposed early in an innings. They lack someone who can accelerate and score quickly in the middle-overs. Abdul Samad has got a lot of appreciation for the same in the domestic circuit and it will be interesting to see how he performs.
3. Death Bowling
Another case of strength being a weakness for the Orange Army. While their powerplay bowling is amongst the best in the tournament, their death bowling, on the other hand, doesn’t look promising. Bhuvneshwar Kumar is returning from an injury so you don’t know how he will perform from the word go. Sandeep Sharma and Siddharth Kaul depend heavily on the “knuckleball” in the death overs. They will go for runs if batsmen line them up as they don’t have enough pace to trouble the batters. Billy Stanlake is the only bowler with a good pace but it is highly unlikely that he will get to play most of the games.
You need to have a good yorker in the death overs for the variations to work too. Although the conditions in the UAE will suit the variations but nothing is better than a good yorker in the death overs. The bowlers will have to take responsibility as the match can get out of hands in a matter of a few bad overs.
Verdict
Sunrisers have invested in young talent this season. They did well in the auction and covered a few areas where they lacked last season. They brought in Fabian Allen and Mitchell Marsh, as they lacked a good finisher in the slog overs. Their squad looks solid enough to be a factor as the conditions in the UAE will suit their brand of cricket. Overall, it depends on how their opening combination and young players perform this season. If they do well, then they are a chance of reaching the play-offs this season.
Written by Robin Rounder – follow Robin on Twitter today.
Watch: CricBlog caught up with Cricket with Sparsh to analyse the Sunrisers Hyderabad squad ahead of IPL 2020. Watch here.
