New Delhi: SunRisers Hyderabad (SRH) skipper Kane Williamson won the toss and elected to bowl against Rajasthan Royals in their Indian Premier League (IPL) encounter here at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Sunday.
At the time of toss, Williamson said: “We are going to have a bowl. After a few conversations with guys who have played here, we think it should be a consistent surface. Three changes: Nabi, Bhuvi and Samad are back. Warner, Suchit and Kaul miss out on this one. We know that as a group we need to come together and build on the positive parts.”
“It has been difficult, but we need to pull together now. This captaincy change is very sudden, so I just need to pick up and make the small adjustments which hopefully will reflect on the result. The goal for the last half of the campaign is to improve our performances. There are many areas we need to improve, wickets in the powerplay are one. We have to do our best with our resources and it’s important we adjust to the conditions,” Williamson added.
On the other hand, Rajasthan Royals skipper Sanju Samson said:” The last match we played here was a noon game as well and it’s good to set a strong total. You ony look for a good start in the powerplay and build up from there. Two changes: Unadkat is resting and Tyagi comes in. Anuj Rawat is making his debut in place of Shivam Dube. We just want to keep it simple and express ourselves, see the ball and react accordingly.”
SRH on Saturday made a surprise announcement that Williamson will be taking over from Warner as the captain of the side for the remainder of the 2021 season. Warner has also been dropped from the playing XI for Sunday’s game.
While Rajasthan Royals on Saturday announced the signing of South African fast bowler Gerald Coetzee as a replacement for England’s Liam Livingstone for the remainder season. For Rajasthan Royals, Kartik Tyagi comes in, and Anuj Rawat is making his debut.
Rajasthan Royals:
Jos Buttler, Yashasvi Jaiswal, Sanju Samson(w/c), Anuj Rawat, David Miller, Riyan Parag, Rahul Tewatia, Chris Morris, Kartik Tyagi, Chetan Sakariya, Mustafizur Rahman
SRH:
Jonny Bairstow (wk), Kane Williamson, Manish Pandey, Kedar Jadhav, Vijay Shankar, Rashid Khan, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Sandeep Sharma, Khaleel Ahmed, Abdul Samad, Mohammad Nabi