Published: Apr 13, 2016, 03:24 PM (IST)
Edited: Apr 13, 2016, 05:03 PM (IST)
After a win in their first match, Gujarat Lions and Rising Pune Supergiants are set to clash against each other in Match No.6 of Indian Premier League (IPL) 2016 at Rajkot on Thursday. Suresh Raina and MS Dhoni played alongside for Chennai Super Kings (CSK) for past eight seasons, this time around they will be seen playing against each other for the very first time in the tournament. The two teams feature a lot of faces from the suspended CSK and at least six players, who played in the same side till last year, will now be in opposite camps. Both teams are at the same level this league so far and one of them will look take the upper hand by winning this match. FULL CRICKET SCORECARD: Gujarat Lions vs Rising Pune Supergiants, IPL 2016, Match 6 at Rajkot
Dhoni and co. showed their dominance as they opened their accounts against defending champions Mumbai Indians (MI) winning by 9 wickets. The top-order comfortably handled the game leaving no options for middle-order Steven Smith and Dhoni to provide the finishing touches. With regards to the bowling department, Ishant Sharma and Mitchell Marsh shone grabbing two apiece leaving MI in a poor position at their home ground. RPS also have new cricketers like Murugan Ashwin showing a glimpse of what he possess with 1 for 16 by the end of 4 overs. With Murugan’s show, Ravichandran Ashwin was kept aside once again with the pacers providing the required performance for RPS.
GL’s team efforts paid off in their first win be it in Dwayne Bravo’s 4-for or Aaron Finch’s fifty or Dinesh Karthik’s finish, which helped them register their first win of IPL. Though a lot was expected from the top-order that included Brendon McCullum and the skipper himself, it was Karthik, who provided the impetus. The big positive for the Lions was the heart showed by the young Ishan Kishan. The Under-19 Indian captain played with a lot of gumption and his confident flick off Mitchell Johnson was a proof of that. Bravo continued his impressive form in T20s as he became the only IPL player to do a double of scoring 1,000 runs and picking up 100 wickets.
All in all, both teams have their positives but GL’s top-order slack can face tough competition from RPS over all dominant side. RP Singh with Mitchell Marsh will test the batsmen with a hope to watch R Ashwin play his potential against GL. As for with likes of Aaron Finch along with youngsters Kishan and experienced players like McCullum and Raina will put RPS bowlers to test.
Squads:
Gujarat Lions: Suresh Raina (c), Ravindra Jadeja, Dwayne Bravo, James Faulkner, Brendon McCullum, Praveen Kumar, Dale Steyn, Dinesh Karthik, Dwayne Smith, Dhawal Kulkarni, Aaron Finch, Eklavya Dwivedi, Andrew Tye, Ishan Kishan, Jaydev Shah, Shadab Jakati, Pravin Tambe, Pradeep Sangwan, Amit Mishra, Shivil Kaushik, Aksh Deep Nath, Sarabjeet Ladda, Umang Sharma, Paras Dogra.
Rising Pune Supergiants: MS Dhoni (c), Steven Smith, Faf du Plessis, Ajinkya Rahane, Ravichandran Ashwin, Mitchell Marsh, Ashwin Murugan, Ishant Sharma, Kevin Pietersen, Irfan Pathan, Thisara Perera, Rajat Bhatia, Ashoke Dinda, Scott Boland, Peter Handscomb, RP Singh, Adam Zampa, Ishwar Pandey, Deepak Chahar, Jaskaran Singh, Baba Aparajith, Ankush Bains, Ankit Sharma.
Time: 20:00 IST | 14:30 GMT
(Shruti Hariharan is Content Writer with CricketCountry. You can follow her on Twitter at @Shruti_2890)
