Less than 48 hours after nailing an in-form Royal Challengers Bangalore, Punjab Kings will hope to scalp another front-runner in Delhi Capitals, at the Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad on Sunday.
Having lost to DC by six wickets in the reverse fixture, PBKS has a score to settle. However, its vulnerable middle-order will face scrutiny.
Explosive batsmen
This ‘Northern Derby’ promises to be a high-scoring encounter. The teams are capable of shifting gears, courtesy their explosive frontline batsmen. Leading contenders for the Orange Cap — PBKS leader K. L. Rahul and DC's Shikhar Dhawan and Prithvi Shaw — will resume the race.
With Chris Gayle and Shimron Hetmyer making no secret of their desires to be in the mix, and Nicholas Pooran desperate to end his poor form (four ducks so far), a few bowlers could come under the pump.
With seven games left to play, DC has five victories and PBKS three. Clearly, the result assumes more importance for the Punjab side. It needs a winning run like the one in IPL 2020, where it notched up five successive triumphs in the second half of the competition.
Since PBKS will play its last five matches in Bengaluru, providing a sense of homecoming for Karnataka lads Rahul and Mayank Agarwal, and former RCB star Gayle, it can stay optimistic of its qualifying prospects.
The Teams (From)
Punjab Kings: KL Rahul (c & wk), Mayank Agarwal, Chris Gayle, Mandeep Singh, Prabsimran Singh, Nicholas Pooran (wk), Sarfaraz Khan, Deepak Hooda, Murugan Ashwin, Ravi Bishnoi, Harpreet Brar, Mohammed Shami, Arshdeep Singh, Ishan Porel, Darshan Nalkande, Chris Jordan, Dawid Malan, Jhye Richardson, Shahrukh Khan, Riley Meredith, Moises Henriques, Jalaj Saxena, Utkarsh Singh, Fabian Allen, Saurabh Kumar.
Delhi Capitals: Shikhar Dhawan, Prithvi Shaw, Ajinkya Rahane, Rishabh Pant, Shimron Hetmyer, Marcus Stoinis, Chris Woakes, R Ashwin, Shams Mulani, Amit Mishra, Lalit Yadav, Pravin Dubey, Kagiso Rabada, Anrich Nortje, Ishant Sharma, Avesh Khan, Steve Smith, Umesh Yadav, Ripal Patel, Vishnu Vinod, Lukman Meriwala, M Siddarth, Tom Curran, Sam Billings, Aniruddha Joshi.
Match Starts 7:30 pm.
