Beware of the SunRisers Hyderabad

A fearsome Pace attack, ferocious openers but an inexperienced middle order, yes, these are the first thoughts which would strike anyone`s mind when they would see Sunrisers Hyderabad`s squad for IPL 2014. They lost to Rajasthan Royals in the playoffs last year, both teams performed better than their expectations. SunRisers Hyderabad faced a leadership crisis in the last year`s IPL with the captaincy baton being transferred from Kumar Sangakkara to Cameron White and now finally to the Indian opener and the only Indian in this year`s Wisden`s top five cricketers list Shikhar Dhawan. This team caught everyone`s attention for defending low totals thanks to some nerveshredding performances by Dale Steyn and Amit Mishra. Their mantra this season is “New look, New team”. However, the core of the team remains the same as Dhawan, Mishra, Ishant, Steyn and Sammy will be adorning the SunRisers cap once again.

BOWLING ATTACK :
SunRisers seem to have bought the best Pace attack as compared to any other team in IPL 2014. The attack will be headed by the South African Paceman, a warrior, and the WISDEN cricketer of the year Dale Steyn with Ishant Sharma, Jason Holder, Bhuvaneshwar Kumar, Irfan Pathan and Darren Sammy. But given due respect to the conditions they will be playing in, will this attack produce the results that they need to finish this season as Winners? To support this attack they have the Indian leg spinner Amit Mishra who troubled a lot of batsmen with his flight and spin in the recently concluded World T20. Mishra was their top wicket taker last year and he has got better ever since. They have got Karn Sharma who partnered Mishra last year as well. What will be interesting to see is whether they play the Jammu and Kashmir all rounder Parveez Rasool instead of Karn Sharma.

BATTING :
SunRisers have managed to bag the most destructive opening batsmen in the form of David Warner and Aaron Finch. It will be a surprise to see who amongst Dhawan, Warner and Finch will open. Finch and Warner have been in an extremely good form as compared to Dhawan who was replaced by Rahane as an opener in World T20. But what the owners have missed out on is to have a decent middle order batsmen. The entire middle order responsibility comes on their wicket keeper Naman Ojha and all rounders in the form of Pathan and Sammy. But they would miss an experienced middle order batsman. They have a few promising uncapped players like Srikant Aniruddha, Lokesh Rahul, Manpreet Juneja all of whom have failed to impress earlier. One batsman I am looking forward to seeing is Ricky Bhui, 17 year old India U-19 batsman, who is the youngest player to have been sold this season, failed to live upto the expectations in the U-19 World Cup but has loads of talent to be the next Virat or Yuvi in the coming years (the batsman recently scored a century on debut in the Domestic One Day tournament to save the face of the Andhra Cricket team.)
Lastly, the team looks strong and no one would write them off this season. But it is all upto the demeanor in which the whole team performs than upto individual brilliance to win an IPL. This is what has been the success mantra of any of the previous IPL winners. Good Luck SunRisers.
Probable XI: Dhawan(C), Finch, Warner, Ojha(wk), Aniruddha/Bhui/V Rao, Pathan, Sammy, Mishra, Rasool/Karn Sharma, Steyn, Ishant/Bhuvaneshwar