From Sehwag-Gambhir to Sehwag v/s Gambhir in a week
For the recently concluded T20 World Cup, India were among the pre tournament favourites and they did the claim no harm with their performance against the defending champions, England. One of the major reasons for this was the terrifying opening pair of Sehwag-Gambhir. The Indian opening pair is regarded as one of the most lethal. Sehwag and Gambhir are two quality players and the world is aware of that and the threat they can pose is not unheard or unseen. They were much talked about in the tournament owing to the fact that both failed to deliver. With Sehwag being benched for 2 matches due to a feud with the skipper or because of the game plan; I think all of you know, they were much talked about for off the field reasons than on-field ones.
Both have a chance now to make people forget their World Cup debacle and build fresh memories.
Here we are, one week hence, talking about Sehwag v/s Gambhir; who will rule the roost? There are bound to be some eyebrows raised, but the answer will settle them all. The reason is the commencement of the Champions League T20. Both Delhi Daredevils and Kolkata Knight Riders have qualified for the tournament. They find themselves up against each other, in their respective tournament openers, tomorrow, 13th October 2012 at 15:30 GMT or 20:00 hours IST at the Super Sport Park, Centurion.
Although Sehwag has been eased of the captaincy to concentrate on his batting and Jayawardene has been handed the reigns, it was and will be a Sehwag v/s Gambhir show. It is going to be intense, interesting, competitive and hopefully mouthwatering.
Delhi Daredevils have a star studded batting lineup with the likes of Sehwag himself, Jaya, Kevin Pietersen, Warner and Ross. Jaya, being the captain is certain to play, and given the class of the man and his hunger having missed out on the T20 World Cup, KP is almost certain to get a shot too. Now, it’s going to be a call between Warner and Ross, since they cannot afford to make the same mistake they did in the virtual semi final in the IPL, benching Morne Morkel.
Their bowling looks in safe hands too, given the conditions. The likes of Morkel, Pathan, Umesh Yadav and Varun Aaron sound deadly enough and can create havoc, given the South African conditions.
Kolkata on the other hand, have their batting dependent on their star 3 players, Gauti, Kallis and Mcculum, two of whom have been in perilously poor form. The likes of Manvinder Bisla, Tiwary, Shakib-al-Hasan may find it difficult out here in South Africa. Their bowling, which was ideal for the sub-continental conditions, will be a little less potent here. They are reliant mainly on their slow bowlers and even their medium fast bowlers, Balaji and Bhatia use the variations; cut the pace off the ball, which won’t work that well here.
Considering Delhi’s star studded batting line-up has 2 of the top 10 run getters in the recently concluded World Cup, in the likes of Ross (147) and Jaya (243), their batting looks formidable. Sehwag can be back to his lethal best in no time and KP, having spent time in the studio, would be itching to go out there and score some runs. Their bowling is also potent, possessing both swing and pace. They have one of the best pace attacks in the entire competition.
Kolkata meanwhile, have batsman running in poor form. Both Gambhir and Kallis haven’t got runs under their belt. The only bright spark, McCullum seems to be in some sort of form having scored 212 runs in the World T20, but might have to sit out to accommodate another foreign recruit to take the all rounder’s slot. The others, likes of Bisla, Tiwary, and Shukla, don’t have much experience of the conditions and will certainly take time to acclimatize and adapt.
Their bowling too, might be ineffective here, since there is much more bounce and carry in the wickets, with swing and seam in abundance, while they crave for slow and low wickets.
Sunil Narine and Lee will be the 2 major assets in their bowling line-up and would be under high pressure to deliver.
Though both sides are pretty strong, it looks like Delhi are finally going to have a laugh over the Knight Riders, who beat them on 3 occasions in the last IPL.
Key Battles:
Sehwag v/s Lee
Kevin Pietersen v/s Sunil Narine
Gauti-Mcculum v/s Morkel
Kallis v/s Yadav
Probable Line-ups:
Delhi Daredevils:
Sehwag, Jaya (c), KP, Ross, Ojha (wk), Venugopal, Negi, Pathan, Morkel, Yadav, Aaron.
Kolkata Knight Riders:
Gambhir(c), Bisla (wk), Kallis, Tiwary, Shakib, Yusuf Pathan, Laxmi Shukla, Bhatia, Lee, Balaji, Narine.