What

Sunrisers Hyderabad and Kolkata Knight Riders will contest in the Eliminator – the second of the playoff matches of VIVO IPL 2017. SRH finished the league season in third position, while KKR completed the top four; both teams won eight matches, but SRH finished with one additional point courtesy their washed-out match against RCB.

Sunrisers Hyderabad have played good cricket through the season, but a fair assessment would be that they have not played their best cricket yet. When they’ve won, they’ve generally done so fairly convincingly. But they’ve not been able to motor on and stitch together a series of wins; they’ve not been on a series of 3, 4 or 5 wins like some of the other teams which have qualified have done. The team has all bases covered – and it is a question of all things falling in place at the same time. SRH will miss the experience of Ashish Nehra, who has been ruled out because of the hamstring injury he sustained in one of the earlier matches. There are question marks over the participation of Yuvraj Singh – who hurt his little finger in one of the earlier matches – and a decision on his participation will be taken after a pre-match fitness test.

Just past the halfway stage of the league season, KKR held the top position in the table with seven wins from nine matches. But in their remaining five matches, they managed a solitary win and just had enough to make the playoffs. Heading into their final league match, KKR had the opportunity to finish at the top of the table (which had the added incentive of a second shot at qualifying for the final), but they lost that game against the Mumbai Indians, and instead qualified fourth. En route, the team has had injury worries; Robin Uthappa missed a couple of matches, while Nathan Coulter-Nile has missed the team’s last three outings. Both players should be available for this knockout clash, and if they are, KKR will return to their first-choice XI.

Sunrisers Hyderabad are the defending champions and would love to have a shot at defending the title. Will they be able to clear this hurdle and progress further? Both teams, apart from strategizing for each other, will also have to keep an eye on the weather as there are predictions for evening showers.

When

17 May 2017, 2000 Hrs IST

Where

M Chinnaswamy Stadium, Bengaluru

The Protagonists

SRH have in their line-up the Orange Cap holder and the Purple Cap holder; David Warner sits atop the list of run-scorers this season, while Bhuvneshwar Kumar sits on the perch of the wicket-taker’s list, and it is only natural that that they will be expected to play lead roles with bat and ball respectively.

KKR have generally come hard through their opening pair of Chris Lynn and Sunil Narine, and the right-left pair will be expected to get the team off to a hurried start yet again. Gautam Gambhir and Uthappa have been steady accumulators of runs, and they will be expected to take control of things in the middle overs. On the bowling front, the eight overs bowled by Coulter-Nile and Narine could have a telling impact on the outcome of the match.

Match within the match

Gautam Gambhir is considered among the top players of spin, while Rashid Khan – 17 wickets in the competition – has bamboozled many batsmen this season. Round one of the contest went to Rashid Khan, who ‘clean bowled’ the southpaw. Will Gambhir be able to settle scores on this occasion?

The other interesting contest will be between David Warner and compatriot Nathan Coulter-Nile. Many bowlers have tried in vain to contain SRH’s left-handed opener this season. Will Coulter-Nile be able to keep the lid on the SRH skipper?

Head to Head

Overall: Matches played – 11, Sunrisers Hyderabad Won – 4, Kolkata Knight Riders Won – 7

These two teams also met in the Eliminator in IPL 2016 too; on that occasion, Sunrisers Hyderabad batted first, scored 162-8 and then restricted the Kolkata Knight Riders to 140-8.

Trivia

Sunrisers Hyderabad have an unimpressive record on the road this season; they’ve won only two of the six matches on the road (match against Royal Challengers Bangalore was abandoned without a ball being bowled).

Sunrisers Hyderabad are the only team to have stuck with the same opening pair this season; David Warner and Shikhar Dhawan have opened the innings for SRH in all their 13 matches.

The Sunrisers Hyderabad have lost the fewest wickets in the Powerplay overs this season; they’ve lost only 10 wickets in the Powerplay overs in the 13 matches they’ve played.

The Kolkata Knight Riders have the best scoring rate in the Powerplay overs – 9.73.

Sunrisers Hyderabad’s eight wins this season have been in four bundles of two wins each. SRH have not managed to win more than two matches on the bounce.

What Next

The winner of this tie will clash with the Mumbai Indians in Qualifier 2 (scheduled to be played in Bengaluru on May 19). For the loser, it will be curtains as far as VIVO IPL 2017 is concerned.