Daredevils look to maintain momentum against Deccan

The Virender Sehwag-led outfit, which was completely off-colour in its first two outings against Mumbai Indians and Rajasthan Royals, silenced critics last night in Mumbai by chasing down an imposing target of 188 for a three-wicket victory.

David Warner (46), Sehwag (37) Venugopal Rao (31) and Aaron Finch (25) finally shone with the bat to power Delhi to what was a desperately-needed triumph. Going into the game against Deccan Chargers here tomorrow at the Ferozshah Kotla ground, Delhi will again rely heavily on Sehwag and his opening partner Warner to provide them with a solid platform.

Apart from the openers, the Delhi team would also pin hopes on Venugopal Rao, who has shown sparks of brilliance, Aaron Finch and James Hopes to come good with their bats. They would also require expensive buy Irfan Pathan, back to cricket after injury, to fire with both the bat and ball.

In the bowling department, however, Delhi will have to quickly get their act together if they want to counter the likes of Deccan skipper Kumar Sangakkara, Jean Paul Duminy, Bharat Chipli and Shikhar Dhawan.

Other than Morne Morkel, no one else seemed to have troubled the opponents so far in the tournament and if the injured South African speedster fails to make it to the playing XI tomorrow, the team would be desperately looking at Ashok Dinda, Shahbaz Nadeem and Pathan to prove their worth.

Delhi would also be keen to make a strong comeback in front of their home crowd here, having suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of Mumbai Indians by eight wickets in their inaugural game when they got bundled out of a mere 95.

Delhi certainly start favourites against Deccan Chargers, who have won just one match out of four so far. Yet, it will be at their own peril that Delhi would be taking their opponents lightly and let the advantage slip out of their hands.

The Hyderabad outfit are expected to come out all guns blazing here, as a defeat tomorrow would mean an uphill task for them to book a spot in the next stage of the competition. But for that, the Chargers need to pull up their socks in all three departments of the game.

Besides their 33-run victory over Royal Challengers Bangalore, Deccan Chargers have been far from impressive in this edition of the IPL so far. However, they are aware of their potential and hence, would be desperate to get into the rhythm at the earliest.

The batting that boasts of players such as Sangakkara, Duminy, Daniel Christian, Shikhar Dhawan, Ishank Jaggi and Chipli just need to click as a unit and peak at the right time.

As far as their bowling is concerned, the team would be hoping that South African pacer Dale Steyn and Manpreet Gony, who claimed three wickets each against Royal Challengers, would chip in with some useful contributions tomorrow as well, while Ishant Sharma, Christian and Amit Mishra will also get into the rhythm.

The Teams (From):

Deccan Chargers: Kumar Sangakkara (c), Ashish Reddy, Anand Rajan, Ankit Sharma, Akash Bhandari, Bharat Chipli, Daniel Christian, Kedar Devdhar, Shikhar Dhawan, Jean Paul Duminy, Manpreet Gony, Harmeet Singh, Ishank Jaggi, Michael Lumb, Chris Lynn, Ishan Malhotra, Amit Mishra, Pragyan Ojha, Ravi Teja, Jaydev Shah, Ishant Sharma, Sunny Sohal, Dale Steyn, Rusty Theron, Cameron White, Arjun Yadav.
Delhi Daredevils: Virender Sehwag (c), Varun Aaron, Ajit Agarkar, Travis Birt, Robin Bist, Unmukt Chand, Ajit Chandila, Ashok Dinda, Aaron Finch, Robert Frylinck, James Hopes, Colin Ingram, Andrew McDonald, Morne Morkel, Shahbaz Nadeem, Yogesh Nagar, Prashant Naik, Naman Ojha, Irfan Pathan, Rajesh Pawar, Aavishkar Salvi, Sridharan Sriram, Roelof van der Merwe, Venugopal Rao, Vikas Mishra, Matthew Wade, David Warner, Tejashwi Yadav, Umesh Yadav, Vivek Yadav.