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We look at SRH’s chances of qualifying (PC: AP)
Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) added another huge obstacle to their path to the top four this season by losing another home match — a huge, seven-wicket defeat to Mumbai Indians (MI) at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium on Wednesday (April 23). They are now placed ninth in the points table with just two wins from eight matches — which is more than half of the group stage — six losses with a negative Net Run Rate of -1.361.
MI skipper Hardik Pandya won the toss and opted to bowl first. Trent Boult and Deepak Chahar reduced SRH to 35/5 in the first innings. Heinrich Klaasen’s 71 (44) and Abhinav Manohar’s 43 (37) helped them reach 143/8. In reply, Rohit Sharma’s clinical 70 (46) and Suryakumar Yadav’s unbeaten 40 (19) made light work of the chase.
SRH’s chances of qualifying are quite low, and the Orange Army would need a huge comeback to make it possible. From the remaining six matches, they need to win all to get to 16 points, which should give them a good opportunity to get into the top-four without needing too much help of NRR calculations or other results going their way.
They can also qualify with 14 points or five wins, but that would be quite difficult and need at least a few other results, out of their control, to go favorably.
“Abhinav and Klassy got us to a good total, but we couldn’t get through this innings. Needed a guy to really steady the ship,” Pat Cummins said after the match. “You have to build your innings here, if you face a few balls you can catch up. The difference between our first game where we got 280 odd and then on the same surface we got rolled over. In T20, the margins are also very little, you need to perform on the given day. (On the road ahead) We have a few away games now, it will be about assessing each wicket as quickly as possible. Some days it will be all-out attack, some days it will be about weighing our options,” he added.
