"The situation is looking depressing" - Aakash Chopra on SunRisers Hyderabad's loss to KKR in IPL 2022

The Sunrisers Hyderabad were annihilated by the Kolkata Knight Riders [P/C: iplt20.com]

Aakash Chopra believes that the SunRisers Hyderabad's (SRH) losing streak and crushing defeat against the Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) have diminished their chances of making the IPL 2022 playoffs.

KKR handed Kane Williamson's side a 54-run drubbing in Saturday's (May 14) Indian Premier League encounter. The loss leaves SRH with an uphill task to qualify for the tournament's knockout stages.

While reviewing the SRH-KKR game in a video shared on his YouTube channel, Aakash Chopra was pessimistic about the SunRisers Hyderabad's chances of progressing in the tournament. He reasoned:

"Hyderabad's story is that they say winning is a habit but losing is too, and that's what is happening. They had won five consecutive matches but they are not able to win even one match after that. The situation is looking depressing. They can also reach 14 points but they have a negative net run rate, so NRR is going to trouble Kane Williamson's side."

Speaking on SunRisers Hyderabad's run chase against KKR, the former Indian batter highlighted Williamson's travails with the bat in IPL 2022. Chopra explained:

"When it was their (SRH's) turn to bat, you expect Kane to score runs. Kane had 28% dot balls in 2020, 38% in 2021 and it has become 48% in 2022. Here also if you see, he scored nine runs off 17 balls, which includes a four, which means here also there were 13-14 dot balls."

He added that the SRH skipper's excruciatingly slow starts are not helping his team's cause. Chopra observed:

"He is not able to score runs or we should say the bat is not firing. If we come continuously to open and give an extremely slow start, it does not work with that. Andre Russell dismisses him."

A season to forget for Kane Williamson 🤯

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Williamson managed just nine runs off 17 balls before he was castled by Andre Russell while trying to play an ungainly scoop shot. The usually silken stroke player has aggregated just 208 runs at a dismal average of 18.90 and a lowly strike rate of 92.86 in IPL 2022 thus far.

"Abhishek Sharma was the pick of the batters" - Aakash Chopra on the SunRisers Hyderabad batting line-up

Abhishek Sharma scored 43 runs off 28 deliveries [P/C: iplt20.com]

However, Aakash Chopra did pick Abhishek Sharma as the bright spark in the SunRisers Hyderabad batting. He said:

"Abhishek Sharma was batting well but when Rahul Tripathi was dismissed caught and bowled, it was actually a good catch by [Tim] Southee, then it was clear that the team is stuck. Abhishek Sharma was the pick of the batters."

Chopra concluded by observing that the SunRisers Hyderabad did not have the batting depth to make a match of it once their top few batters were dismissed. The reputed commentator elaborated:

"Till the time [Aiden] Markram was there along with him, there was life left in the match. It seemed you can probably win the match from there, make it more competitive but Markram became a victim of Umesh. When Abhishek Sharma got out, it felt it was over."

He added:

"Nicholas Pooran was caught and bowled by Sunil Narine. After that, what is left, when five batters get out, it seems the batting is over for this team."

The SunRisers Hyderabad are currently placed eighth in the IPL 2022 points table with 10 points to their credit. Even if they win their remaining two matches by massive margins, they will need a lot of other results to go in their favor to make the IPL 2022 playoffs.