Bottom of the table placed Delhi Daredevils will look to redeem some pride when they take on play-offs chasing Rajasthan Royals when the two teams clash in an Indian Premier League match on Thursday.
Bottom of the table placed Delhi Daredevils will look to redeem some pride when they take on play-offs chasing Rajasthan Royals when the two teams clash in an Indian Premier League match on Thursday. After losing all the five matches since the return to India, Delhi now can only play for pride as they look to salvage some points in the bag.
Rajasthan are placed third in the table with 12 points but they cannot take their place for granted as an interesting battle is on to qualify for the top four. The likes of Sunrisers Hyderabad, Royal Challengers Bangalore and Kolkata Knight Riders’ challenge are also in with a chance hence Rajasthan would look to strengthen their position by winning against struggling Daredevils.
Rajasthan has produced match winners when it was required. The likes of Steven Smith, James Faulkner, Pravin Tambe and the rest have been successful in lifting their side. It will be interesting to see if skipper Shane Watson keeps the opening slot with him after a successful experiment in the last match against Chennai Super Kings.
On the other side, nothing is working for Kevin Pietersen’s Daredevils and on Tuesday, they were at the receiving end of Yuvraj Singh’s blistering form as well as the fury of AB de Villiers. They need to ensure that batting and bowling click together along with fielding too. One factor that works in favour of the Delhi side is their skipper Kevin Pietersen, who keeps encouraging his players in the tough times. Quinton de Kock has failed to play to his potential and an injury to Pietersen has also not allowed the Englishman to be at his best. South African JP Duminy has been their standout player so far in the tourney.
Teams
Rajasthan Royals: Shane Watson (c), Ajinkya Rahane, James Faulkner, Stuart Binny, Sanju Samson, Brad Hodge, Steven Smith, Abhishek Nayar, Ben Cutting, Kane Richardson, Tim Southee, Unmukt Chand, Ankush Bains, Vikramjeet Malik, Rahul Tewatia, Ankit Sharma, Amit Mishra, Deepak Hooda, Rajat Bhatia, Kevon Cooper, Iqbal Abdulla, Dhawal Kulkarni, Pravin Tambe, Karun Nair, Dishant Yagnik.
Delhi Daredevils: Kevin Pietersen (C), Mayank Agarwal, N Coulter-Nile, Q de Kock, JP Duminy, Kedar Jadhav, Dinesh Karthik, S Kaul, Milind Kumar, Mohammed Shami, S Nadeem, J Neesham, W Parnell, HS Sharath, R Sharma, LR Shukla, R Shukla, R Taylor, Manoj Tiwary, S Tiwary, JD Unadkat, M Vijay and Kedar Yadav.
