Kolkata Knight Riders will have to break the agonising sequence of debacles when they clash with defending champions Sunrisers Hyderabad in the IPL eliminator, in Bengaluru, on Wednesday.
Only 5 batsmen have hit a six to take their team to victory when they needed 4 or more off the final ball.
As we write this we still await the crucial India-Australia knock-out in Mohali. But India's individual performances in the T20 World Cup so far haven't been truly impressive. A look at the most valuable player index (MVPI) table reveals that there's no Indian player in the top 20. MVPI merges a player's batting + bowling + fielding performance into a single 'run equivalent'. The formula to compute the MVP is devised to reward batsmen who score runs at a high strike rate, bowlers who take wickets at low economy rate and fielders who field the best (take a lot of catches and participate in run-outs). Since this is a relatively low scoring tournament we have assumed a team's par score to be 150, and each wicket to be worth 15 'runs'. It isn't a surprise that players from New Zealand dominate the rankings so far, although Joe Root tops the table after his 83 in 44 balls against South Africa.
Kolkata Knight Riders defeated Sunrisers Hyderabad by 17 runs in their Indian Premier League match, in Kolkata, on Saturday.
Facing early elimination, two-time champions Kolkata Knight Riders need to record a win to stay afloat when they take on table-toppers Sunrisers Hyderabad.
Aruneel Sadadekar/Rediff.com picks his IPL Dream Team of Season 9. Check it out!
Even as the dust settles down on IPL 9, Bikash Mohapatra/Rediff.com presents his Dream XI.
Brilliant bowling by the pace duo of Umesh Yadav and Morne Morkel, followed by skipper Gautam Gambhir's superb half-century, powered Kolkata Knight Riders to a comprehensive eight-wicket win over Sunrisers Hyderabad in their Indian Premier League (IPL) match on Saturday.
Chasing a victory target of 159, Mumbai achieved the target in 18.4 overs with youngster Nitish Rana scoring 45 and veteran keeper Parthiv Patel scoring 39 off 24 balls.
Ashish Nehra has contributed significantly to the Indian team's recent success in Twenty 20s, and the old warhorse says he is enjoying his role of a mentor in the fast bowling department.
Featuring India, the West Indies, Pakistan, India, Afghanistan.
Mind games have begun ahead of the Asia Cup final played between host Bangladesh and India at Mirpur on Sunday. While India's team director Ravi Shastri has termed it as 'yet another match', Bangladesh skipper Mashrafe Mortaza called India as clear favourites to relieve pressure from his young side in the title clash. "We all know that Indians are clear favourites in the final. Let there be no debates or discussions on that," Mashrafe said at a packed match-eve press conference. India have been in rampaging form with four convincing wins in the tournament, including the 45-run thumping of Bangladesh in their opening league match. "What we have got is a young team which has won matches playing as a unit. We still don't have a T20 star, who can single-handedly win us a match. Crowd, pitch, conditions, everything will favour us but that can never ensure that we will win the final," Mashrafe clarified. Commenting on Shastri's statement, Mashrafe said that for his team which rarely makes final appearances, it's a "big occasion". "What Ravi Shastri has said is absolutely right. It is another match for them as they are used to hype and big matches. They can take it like 10 other matches. "India has played big finals, won trophies. What is easy for them may not be that easy for us. But we are trying to focus on the game, shut ourselves from the hype and remain and play as normally as possible," the Bangladesh skipper said.
Sunrisers Hyderabad won their maiden Indian Premier League trophy. Even as the team from Hyderabad celebrates their triumph, let's analyse the four major turning points of the match.
Two-time champions Kolkata Knight Riders would look to assert their supremacy, while Sunrisers Hyderabad will have revenge on mind when the two teams clash in the Indian Premier League (IPL) Eliminator in New Delhi on Wednesday. Both Sunrisers and KKR finished their league engagements on 16 points each but the Gautam Gambhir-led side ended fourth behind Sunrisers due to inferior net run rate. But going into the do-or-die game, KKR have psychological advantage over the Sunrisers having beaten them on both the occasions during the league stage. KKR thrashed Sunrisres by eight wickets in their first meeting this season and came out victorious by 22 runs in a must-win match last Sunday to qualify for the play-offs.
Harish Kotian/Rediff.com's report card on India's three-ODI series in Bangladesh.
David Warner slammed a whirlwind 50-ball 92 to set up a comfortable 15-run win for Sunrisers Hyderabad over Royal Challengers Bangalore in their Indian Premier League match, in Hyderabad, on Saturday.
Bangladesh shocked New Zealand by five wickets to keep their hopes alive of making it to the semi-finals at the ICC Champions Trophy in Cardiff, on Friday.
Royal Challengers Bangalore beat Sunrisers Hyderabad by 45 runs in their opening match of the Indian Premier League.
Call it a compulsion, but sporting achievements are often measured by numbers in hand and that is precisely why it will be difficult to analyse Bangladesh captain Mashrafe Mortaza's influence and contribution in the country's ever-growing cricketing ambitions.
Star batsman Suresh Raina will look to get some batting practice ahead of the upcoming South Africa series along with some of the other fringe players as India 'A' take on Bangladesh 'A' in a three-match One-Day series, starting in Bengaluru, on Wednesday.
A clutch of Indian stars led by India and Royal Challengers Bangalore captain Virat Kohli are either sidelined or ruled out of this edition of the tournament, lessening the wow factor of the IPL.
Rohit Sharma stamped his class with an authoritative hundred in the company of magnificent Virat Kohli as India annihilated Bangladesh by nine wickets to set up a bumper summit showdown with arch-rivals Pakistan in the ICC Champions Trophy, in Birmingham, on Thursday.
Some teams have completely overhauled their squads. Others retained their core at the IPL Players Auction.
Karun Nair kept Delhi Daredevils' slender hopes of qualifying for the play-offs alive with a 59-ball unbeaten 83 that guided them to a six-wicket victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad in Friday's Indian Premier League match, at the Shaheed Veer Narayan Singh stadium in Raipur, that went down to the wire.
Bangladesh skipper Mashrafe Mortaza admitted they were in a state of sorrow in the aftermath of their inexplicable one-run loss to India but hoped they would return home with their heads held high by winning against New Zealand in their concluding league fixture of ICC World Twenty20 in Kolkata on Saturday. "The whole team is in a state of sorrow, everyone is broken. Nobody is blaming anyone but we've somehow accepted the defeat. Everyone was very upset. They just could not talk to each other. It was so disappointing," Mortaza said summing up the team's mood after their loss in Bengaluru. "We have never lost this way. We have to play our best again. If we get the opportunity, we have to make sure we don't repeat the same mistakes. The conditions are similar but the wicket is different. New Zealand are on top clearly, whereas we lost all three. We will try our best." Mortaza further said saying 'sorry' to their fans would not be enough and they would try to play hard to put the disappointment behind and try to get over the line against the unstoppable Black Caps.
Demoralised Bangladesh will look to end their campaign on a high when they face a rampaging New Zealand.
Rajneesh Gupta presents the finest bowling heroics in the 20th over in recent T20Is.
Rising Pune Supergiants will stand in the way of Kolkata Knight Riders's revival when they clash in an Indian Premier League T20 match?
Spoilt for choice with a pool of top quality performers in their ranks, formidable India are overwhelming favourites against minnows Bangladesh in a proverbial 'David vs Goliath' one-off cricket Test that starts in Hyderabad on Thursday.
David Warner played a captain's knock, smashing an unbeaten 90 runs off 59 balls to power the Sunrisers Hyderabad to a 7-wicket convincing victory against defending champions Mumbai Indians on Monday. Chasing a modest 143-run target, the Sunrisers chased the target with 15 balls to spare in Hyderabad. The Sunrisers have recorded their first points in the points table of IPL 9, while MI have now lost three out of their last four games.
Notwithstanding Rising Pune Supergiants' poor run in IPL-9, Sunrisers Hyderabad mentor VVS Laxman considers the debutante side as a formidable unit and said his team will have to put its best foot forward when they clash with them in their IPL match on Tuesday. "It goes without saying that (RPS Captain M S Dhoni) Dhoni will be looking forward to use Ashwin against Warner and Shikhar. I believe that Pune has got a very formidable batting line up," Laxman said in a pre-match press conference at Hyderabad. "Lot of people talk about Ajinkya Rahane, Steve Smith, Faf Duplessis being similar. They are all extrordinary T20 players. We cannot at all be complecent or we cannot at all underestimate the batting strength of Pune. We are very mindful," he added. The former Test batsman, however, exuded confidence that SRH can take on any opposition if it sticks to its plans and executes them well. "But, I believe that if we concentrate on our plans and try to execute our plans, then we can do well against any opposition. It's more about concentrating and playing to our strength, while strategizing for each and every opposition batsman or bowler," he said. Noting that the MS Dhoni-led Pune team would look to bounce back strongly, Laxman said no team can be ruled out as it is still the early part of the long IPL tournament.
Rajneesh Gupta presents all the fascinating career numbers of players in the World Cup.
The legend of Virat Kohli reached gigantic proportions as the reigning superstar of Indian cricket virtually made the World Twenty20 a one-man show.
Bangladesh all-rounder Mahmdullah finished as the MVP in the recently-concluded Asia Cup T20 tournament ahead of compatriot Sabbir Rahman, who was named as the man of the series. Purnendu Maji and Srinivas Bhogle present the latest edition of the MVP rankings.
Claiming that the team has identified the reason for the loss in the first One-Day International against Bangladesh, India opener Rohit Sharma said that the bowlers should take wickets up-front to put pressure on the opposition in the must-win second match in Mirpur, Dhaka, on Sunday.
As far as the Indian team is concerned, even a 3-0 result against the hosts will not be enough for the second-placed side to claim the number one spot in the ICC rankings, while a favourable outcome for the home team will boost its qualifying chances for the 2017 ICC Champions Trophy.
Srinivas Bhogle and Purnendu Maji analyse IPL performances in Rediff.com's Most Valuable Players ratings.
India captain Virat Kohli reclaimed the top batting spot, while Australia's pace ace Josh Hazlewood has achieved the number-one position in the bowlers' rankings for the first time in his career in the latest MRF Tyres ICC ODI Player Rankings.
The battle for the final two available places in the ICC Champions Trophy 2017 will hot up when Bangladesh squares off against South Africa in the opening match of the three-One-Day International series in Mirpur on Friday and Sri Lanka hosts Pakistan in the first of five matches in Dambulla on Saturday.
'...then Bangladesh would have been the world champions a long time ago!'
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