Former champion Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) would like to step on to the field with a lot of optimism this season despite having finished at the bottom of the pile in the previous edition.
Head coach, and former New Zealand left-arm spinner, Daniel Vettori should be conscious of the fact that it has to settle down into the groove very early in the league to get the momentum and more importantly sustain it.
Led by Pat Cummins, who captained Australia to the 50-over World Cup triumph, has a big task on hand — getting the combination right and bringing the best out of the domestic talent.
Explosive batters like Aiden Markram, Travis Head, the match-winning centurion in the 2023 50-over World Cup final, Heinrich Klaasen, and Glenn Phillips would be the key to the 2016 champion’s fortunes.
However, it is imperative for Indians like Abhishek Sharma, Mayank Agarwal, Washington Sundar and Rahul Tripathi to come good in batting.
Dilemma
The think-tank will face a dilemma as to whom to pick from the foreign pool even as it has plenty of options in case a couple of them fail to come good.
With Cummins, wicketkeeper-batter Klaasen, and Head being certain to play in most of the matches, it would be interesting to see who among Markram, Phillips and Hasaranga would be consistently preferred in the XI.
Cummins to spearhead
In bowling, Cummins will spearhead an attack which has the experienced Bhuvaneshwar Kumar, left-arm pacer T. Natarajan, the fiery Umran Malik, and left-arm seamer Jaydev Unadkat to provide the early breakthroughs.
It will be interesting to see how the middle-overs are marshalled by the likes of leg-spinners Wanindu Hasaranga and Mayank Markande, and left-arm spinner Shahbaz Ahmed.
The Eden test
Sunrisers need to get going from the opening game against Kolkata Knight Riders at Eden Gardens on March 23.
