CHENNAI: Rajasthan Royals skipper Sanju Samson won the toss and elected to bowl first against Sunrisers Hyderabad in the Qualifier 2 of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 at the MA Chidambaram Stadium on Friday.
The Hyderabad-based franchise is in their top form in the IPL 2024 and etched their name on the record book by breaching the highest team total in the IPL three times this season.
The Rajasthan-based franchise started the season on a good note and kept a four-match winning streak two times in the tournament. However, as time passed and we came into the second half of the IPL 2024, the Royals started to maintain their consistency. On Wednesday, RR’s first win came in the Eliminator round when they beat RCB to book their place in the Qualifier 2 match.
In head-to-head encounters, SRH and RR have clashed 19 times, with RR emerging victorious nine times, while SRH claimed victory on ten occasions.
Rajasthan and Hyderabad both have clinched the title one time each so far in history and will be in search of their second title as the winner of this game will lock horns with Kolkata Knight Riders on Sunday.
“We would like to bowl first looking at the conditions and what Chepauk offers in the second half. We are trying our best to recover, the doctors are doing a great job. We are doing much better. We played 70 per cent of our potential with batting and we managed to cross the line. We’d like to be better. Each and every venue, the dimensions change. We are well equipped to prepare accordingly. Same line-up,” Samson said after winning the toss.
SRH skipper Pat Cummins said that Aiden Markram and Jaydev Unadkat come in the playing XI for this encounter.
“That’s fine, we would have bowled. The guys will be aggressive, it’s not going to work every time. We are going to lose wickets sometimes. We were well below our best a couple of days ago. Another chance tonight, much of the same. (Bowling) It’s an ongoing discussion, this ground is a little bit bigger. We’ve got Unadkat coming back in the team as well. Aiden Markram comes in,” Cummins said.
Rajasthan Royals (Playing XI): Yashasvi Jaiswal, Tom Kohler-Cadmore, Sanju Samson (wk/c), Riyan Parag, Dhruv Jurel, Rovman Powell, Ravichandran Ashwin, Trent Boult, Avesh Khan, Sandeep Sharma, Yuzvendra Chahal.
Sunrisers Hyderabad (Playing XI): Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma, Rahul Tripathi, Nitish Reddy, Aiden Markram, Heinrich Klaasen (wk), Abdul Samad, Pat Cummins (c), Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Jaydev Unadkat, T Natarajan. (ANI)