Sunrisers Hyderabad's IPL 2023 qualification chances took a major hit on Saturday evening on their home ground as Lucknow Super Giants defeated them by 7 wickets in the first of the weekend's matches, at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium.
Hyderabad posted 182/6 after electing to bat first and the chase was going pretty one sided in their favour for much of the Lucknow innings before some big strikes from Prerak Mankad, Marcus Stonis and Nicolas Pooran took the game away from the home team.
Earlier, Heinrich Klaasen top-scored for Hyderabad with 47 while Abdul Samad provided a finishing touch with his unbeaten 37 to carry Sunrisers Hyderabad to 182/6 at the
Lucknow's chase was slow off the blocks and after 13 overs, the team was at 89/2 with an asking rate in excess of 13 as they needed 94 off 42 balls. Prerak Mankad, Nicholas Pooran and Marcus Stoinis though switched gears from there as Mankad top-scored with an unbeaten 64 off 45 balls and Pooran remained unbeaten on 44 off 13 balls.Stoinis and Pooran were pivotal in bringing the turning point of the match, smashing 31 runs in the 16th over bowled by Abhishek Sharma.
With the win ending a three-game winless streak, Lucknow are now in fourth place in the points table with 13 points, while Hyderabad's playoffs hopes look bleak.
Hyderabad Won Toss, Elected to Bat First
Electing to bat first, Anmolpreet Singh and Abhishek Sharma hit three fours in the first two overs, before the latter was beaten for pace and bounce by one banged in from Yudhvir Singh and took the glove edge to the keeper.
Rahul Tripathi had a fast start, sweeping and whipping off Krunal for two fours, followed by driving and scooping against Avesh Khan for back-to-back fours. It was followed by Anmolpreet slicing twice off Avesh to take 18 runs off the fifth over.
But Yash Thakur took him out in the final over of the Power-play, as Tripathi could only glove the bouncer on an attempted pull to the wicketkeeper. Anmolpreet continued to hit boundaries on the front foot and back foot before a leading edge on the chip was caught by Amit Mishra off his own bowling in the ninth over.
Klaasen was off the blocks quickly, reverse-sweeping off Mishra for four, followed by hammering Ravi Bishnoi for four and six respectively. But Krunal struck on consecutive deliveries in the 13th over to push Hyderabad on the backfoot.
Krunal extracted a sharp turn to have a charging down Aiden Markram stumped after going past his outside edge and then squared up Glenn Phillips on backfoot by uprooting his off-stump.
Klaasen continued to keep Hyderabad's charge afloat by pulling two short balls from Mishra for sixes over mid-wicket in the 16th over, with Samad supporting him by smacking Yash Thakur over mid-off and Krunal over long-on for a brace of maximums.
Samad followed it up by getting a big top-edge on a pull off Thakur for four and smacked Avesh high over long-on for six. Klaasen got a four off Avesh through a top-edge on pull, before holing out to long-on on the last ball of the 19th over. Samad then heaved Thakur over long-on for six in the final over to drag Hyderabad over 180.
Lucknow's Chase
Chasing 183, Lucknow's opening pair of Quinton de Kock and Kyle Mayers were kept quiet in the first three overs by Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Fazalhaq Farooqui. The mounting pressure got to Mayers, who tried to break free by trying to loft over mid-on against Glenn Phillips, where Aiden Markram dived to his right to complete the catch.
Despite Mankad hitting a couple of fours off Phillips and Fazalhaq Farooqi, Hyderabad never let the pressure evaporate as Lucknow ended the Power-play at 30/1. Quinton de Kock tried to up the ante with two fours and a six off Mayank Markande.
But the leg-spinner had the last laugh as his googly took the top edge off the left-hander's reverse sweep and was caught by a backward point in the ninth over. Mankad and Stoinis got a four each off the spinners, but it was followed by a brief period where the duo were unable to connect with deliveries as Hyderabad cleverly changed pace and lengths.
Mankad finally made the connection when he lofted off Farooqui for four before Stoinis punched off him for a boundary as 14 runs came off the 13th over. Immediately after the timeout, Mankad smashed and pulled Markande for six and four respectively before reaching his maiden IPL fifty in 35 balls.
Stoinis muscled Bhuvneshwar over long-on for six, before smashing two towering sixes over Abhishek's head. But the left-arm spinner bounced back on the third ball of the 16th over as Stoinis holed out to long-off.
Pooran got going from the word go, slog-sweeping over wide long-on for a 105m six, followed by slamming down the ground and bringing out another slow-sweep for two more maximums as 31 runs came off the over.
Mankad continued the boundary-hitting party by launching Natarajan over long-off for six and getting an outside edge run past the keeper for four in the 17th over, followed by Pooran hitting Bhuvneshwar for consecutive fours through the off-side in the 18th over.
After pulling a full toss from Natarajan over mid-wicket for six, Pooran finished off the chase by flicking Farooqui through fine-leg for four to take Lucknow over the line in stunning fashion.
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