Hyderabad: Mohammed Siraj bowled with fire in his belly to return excellent figures of 4/17 as Gujarat Titans restricted Sunrisers Hyderabad to 152 for eight in their Indian Premier League match in Hyderabad Sunday.
Siraj dismissed struggling openers Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma cheaply before coming back to add two more wickets to his tally on a slow surface.
Left-arm spinner R Sai Kishore (2/24) and seamer Prasidh Krishna (2/25) too performed admirably but a wayward Ishant Sharma leaked 53 runs in his four overs to allow SRH cross 150 after they were 135 for eight at the start of the final over.
Head (8) had a fortuitous start as his edge off Siraj went past the stumps for a boundary. However, Siraj had the last laugh as the pacer got rid of the danger man from Australia when the opener flicked one for Sai Sudharsan to complete a smart diving catch at mid-wicket.
The crowd at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium found their voice after a few boundaries.
Siraj, however, had other ideas as the pumped-up seamer sent back Abhishek after the batter took the aerial route but failed to get the timing right and was caught at mid-on.
This meant the SRH openers’ struggles continued in this edition of the IPL as the side reached 45 for two at the end of the power play.
Even as the visitors dominated proceedings at that stage, they faced some anxious moments when Glenn Phillips got injured. After being attended to by the physio, Phillips hobbled off the field.
Ishan Kishan (17) perished when he miscued a pull off a Prasidh Krishna short ball to deep square leg where Ishant completed the catch.
The duo of Nitish Kumar Reddy (31 off 34 balls) and Heinrich Klaasen (27 off 19 balls) tried to revive SRH innings with a fifty-run stand for the fourth wicket, a phase where GT got a few fours and a six by the South African big-hitter against Rashid Khan.
But just when SRH looked like laying the foundation for a respectable score, left-arm spinner Sai Kishore picked up the prized wicket of Klaasen whose leg stump was disturbed as he rocked back to employ the pull shot.
Reddy too perished while trying to smash Sai Kishore out of the park, leaving SRH at 105 for five in the beginning of the 16th over.
PTI
