Hyderabad, May 13 (IANS) Heinrich Klaasen was on the offensive against spinners in making 47 while Abdul Samad provided a finishing touch with 37 not out to carry Sunrisers Hyderabad to 182/6 in 20 overs against Lucknow Super Giants at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium on Saturday.
On a pitch which had turn for the spinners, as seen from Lucknow captain Krunal Pandya’s 2-24, Klaasen and Samad added 58 runs for the sixth wicket to give Hyderabad something to defend in an innings in which many got starts, but couldn’t translate into a big score.
Electing to bat first, Anmolpreet Singh and Abhishek Sharma hit three fours in the first two overs, before the latter was beaten for pace and bounce by one banged in from Yudhvir Singh and took the glove edge to the keeper.
Rahul Tripathi had a fast start, sweeping and whipping off Krunal for two fours, followed by driving and scooping against Avesh Khan for back-to-back fours. It was followed by Anmolpreet slicing twice off Avesh to take 18 runs off the fifth over.
But Yash Thakur took him out in the final over of the Power-play, as Tripathi could only glove the bouncer on an attempted pull to the wicketkeeper. Anmolpreet continued to hit boundaries on the front foot and back foot before a leading edge on the chip was caught by Amit Mishra off his own bowling in the ninth over.
Klaasen was off the blocks quickly, reverse-sweeping off Mishra for four, followed by hammering Ravi Bishnoi for four and six respectively. But Krunal struck on consecutive deliveries in the 13th over to push Hyderabad on the backfoot.
Krunal extracted a sharp turn to have a charging down Aiden Markram stumped after going past his outside edge and then squared up Glenn Phillips on backfoot by uprooting his off-stump.
Klaasen continued to keep Hyderabad’s charge afloat by pulling two short balls from Mishra for sixes over mid-wicket in the 16th over, with Samad supporting him by smacking Yash Thakur over mid-off and Krunal over long-on for a brace of maximums.
Samad followed it up by getting a big top-edge on a pull off Thakur for four and smacked Avesh high over long-on for six. Klaasen got a four off Avesh through a top-edge on pull, before holing out to long-on on the last ball of the 19th over. Samad then heaved Thakur over long-on for six in the final over to drag Hyderabad over 180.
Brief scores:
Sunrisers Hyderabad 182/6 in 20 overs (Heinrich Klaasen 47, Abdul Samad 37 not out; Krunal Pandya 2-24) against Lucknow Super Giants
–IANS
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