Hyderabad, May 6: Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) pacers bowled well in tandem to restrict Gujarat Lions (GL) to a measly score of 126 for six in their IPL-IX encounter at the Uppal Stadium here Friday.
On a pitch offering some assistance to the fast bowlers, left-arm seamers Mustafizur Rahman (2/17), Barinder Sran (1/21 off 3) and Ashish Nehra (none for 23 in 4) kept the opposition batters in check with good control. They were well-supported by Bhuvneshwar Kumar (2/28) and Moses Henriques (1/24). It was Kumar who made the early inroads dismissing Dwayne Smith and the dangerous looking Suresh Raina (20, 10b, 1×4, 2×6).
Except for Aaron Finch (51 n o, 42b, 3×4, 1×6) who batted lower down the order Friday, none of the other GL batsmen were able to establish their supremacy on the game. Dwayne Bravo (18) and Ravindra Jadeja (18) tried to battle it out, but on a wicket which offered movement to the bowlers, they looked a little out of sorts.
In a match, in which Yuvraj Singh came back to competitive cricket for SRH replacing Ashish Reddy, such was the dominance of the bowlers that the first two overs bowled by Kumar and Nehra – turned out to be maidens. This was the first time in IPL-IX that a team had failed to score a single run in the first 12 balls.
Trying to up the ante Smith perished in the third over flashing at Kumar and was caught by Rahman at short third-man. Worse was the condition of Brendon McCullum who toiled 19 balls for his seven runs before holing out to rival skipper David Warner at long-on. PTI
