How the Travis Head-fuelled carnage helped SRH seal the game inside the powerplay against DC

Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) have staged a remarkable turnaround since they suffered a narrow defeat in their opening game of IPL 2024 against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR), winning five out of their next six matches, a majority of them in dominant fashion. From finding themselves in the bottom half of the table in each of the last three seasons, including a couple of wooden spoon finishes, SRH appear a vastly transformed unit under Pat Cummins’ leadership and suddenly are strong favourites for a second title.

Hyderabad has traditionally prospered in the IPL with an Australian at the helm. Adam Gilchrist had led the now-defunct Deccan Chargers to the title in 2009 after a the side had finished at the bottom of the table in the inaugural season. David Warner would then lead the Sunrisers to their only title seven years later. And the way SRH are performing under Cummins since the Aussie pacer replaced Aiden Markram in the job this year, the franchise might end up adding to its trophy collection at the end of the ongoing season.

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At the heart of their revival in the 17th season of the cash-rich league has been their solid batting performances, from strong starts provided by Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma at the top of the order to the Heinrich Klaasen’s explosive knocks in the middle-order that help the ‘Orange Army’ boss the death overs more often than not.

Their dominance with the bat can be gauged from the fact that Royal Challengers Bengaluru’s total of 263/5 had remained the highest total in IPL history for more than a decade, but has been eclipsed four times this season, with SRH alone going past that score thrice. The latest instance of which was against the Delhi Capitals in the first match of the season in New Delhi’s Arun Jaitley Stadium. DC skipper Rishabh Pant raised eyebrows with his decision to let SRH set a target for them despite everything that has happened over the past month, a decision that would end up backfiring on them.

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Head obliterates the Capitals, seals the game in the powerplay

Australia’s Head could easily lay claim to being the most consistent run-scorer and the batter with the most impact across formats over the past one year, having delivered match-winning performances in red as well as white-ball formats. The southpaw had struck a 41-ball 102 against Royal Challengers Bengaluru at the Chinnaswamy earlier on Monday, registering the fastest hundred by an SRH batter in the IPL, and appeared to have carried on from where he left off against the Capitals on Saturday.

The Sunrisers batters certainly have been ruthless this season, but were on another level altogether against the Capitals on Sunday, once again breaking multiple records in breath taking fashion. So much so that they ended up sealing the fate of the contest in the first six overs of the match.

Also Read | Powerplay was the difference, DC were just catching up: Rishabh Pant

Head had been on the money from Ball 1, pulling a length delivery from left-arm pacer Khaleel Ahmed over the cow corner fence to collect the first maximum in just the second delivery of the innings. That was followed by a wide delivery that was instantly crunched through cover point, followed by one bowled slightly closer to the off-stump that was once again pulled, this time over midwicket for a one-bounce four. Abhishek would then make the most of a poor delivery fired down leg in the final ball of the over, redirecting it towards the fine leg fence Khaleel ended up leaking 19 in the first over.

That the 19-run over was the most economical of the six powerplay overs tells you everything you need to know about Sunrisers’ domination of the fielding restriction. It did not matter whom DC skipper Pant decided to hand the new ball to, the way Head and Abhishek were tonking the ball all over Kotla, DC might as well have put a bowling machine at the non-striker’s end.

Pant turned to spin as early as the second over, bringing in off-spinner Lalit Yadav who was greeted with a couple of maximums by Head, making the cardinal mistake of bowling slightly short and allowing the Aussie to get on his backfoot and target the fence in front of square yet again. Both Head and Abhishek would help themselves to a boundary each in the remainder of the over.

Anrich Nortje made his way back into the XI for the first time since getting hammered all over the park by Mumbai Indians’ Romario Shepherd at the Wankhede Stadium. Of the 65 runs that he conceded that day, 32 had been scored in the final over of the MI innings with the West Indian all-rounder going bonkers against him.

Head made sure the South African pacer got to relive the nightmare that he endured two weeks ago all over again by smashing him for 22 runs in the third over. Nortje was guilty of bowling in the slot first up, allowing Head to comfortably loft the ball over mid on. Not all of Nortje’s deliveries thereafter were bad balls. The second one got an inside edge that could have clipped the leg stump and broken the opening stand before it hit the half-century mark; instead, it would run all the way for a streaky boundary.

Head would further underline his dominance with the bat by steering a yorker-length delivery behind point despite not being offered any room whatsoever. The Aussie would then close out the over with a six to complete his half-century in just 16 deliveries, equalling the record for the fastest fifty of the season that had been set by opening partner Abhishek earlier, only to be broken by Jake Fraser-McGurk by a delivery later that evening.

1️⃣2️⃣5️⃣ - THE HIGHEST POWERPLAY SCORE IN T20 CRICKET!! 🔥#DCvSRH #TATAIPL #IPLonJioCinema #IPLinBhojpuri pic.twitter.com/JrRRt53dsh

— JioHotstar Reality (@HotstarReality) April 20, 2024

Lalit would bowl another 21-run over next up, getting smacked for three sixes, and not even Kuldeep Yadav and Mukesh Kumar were spared in the subsequent overs, getting tonked for 20 and 22 runs respectively. Abhishek would take the responsibility of extending a rough welcome to Delhi’s premier bowler Kuldeep, responding to the left-arm wrist spinner’s varying lengths with great use of his feet to smash him for three sixes. Mukesh was then greeted with a quartet of fours by Head, who then ended the powerplay with a lofted drive down the ground that cleared the long off fence comfortably.

The Sunrisers had smashed multiple records along the way, posting the fastest team hundred (5 overs) as well as the highest powerplay score (125/0) across all of T20 cricket along the way, with Head bringing up his half-century in just three overs! He could’ve chased Chris Gayle’s record for the fastest hundred in IPL history, but would fall 11 runs short of the milestone after getting dismissed by Kuldeep.

IPL 2024 | All records SRH made or broke in high-scoring game against DC

Given the form of their batters, SRH have been teasing the prospect of becoming the first team to breach the 300-barrier this season and had the perfect opportunity to do so on Saturday. Kuldeep, however, began fighting back in the middle overs, collecting a four-wicket haul (4/55) in a run-fest and helping slow SRH’s rapid scoring rate down along with Axar Patel (1/29), and SRH eventually finished with 266 — a massive total nevertheless, but well below with the dugout would’ve had in mind at one point.

“I think we were targeting more than that after the first 6 overs but really happy with the team. There was a message to assess the wicket today and I think Travis did really well in that today. It’s always a pleasure since day 1, I’ve been telling him that I’ve been a big fan of him from day 1. We’re lucky he’s in our team. There’s no pressure from the other end so I can just go out and express myself,” Abhishek said in a chat with the broadcasters during the innings break.

However, with 125 runs on the board after six overs and 158 at the halfway stage, it was safe to assume that the game had virtually been sealed and the contest killed off by the Sunrisers batters by the 10th over of the innings, and that it would take a Herculean effort on the part of the Capitals to even take the game deep, let alone win it. Fraser-McGurk and Abhishek Porel mounted a strong response during Delhi’s chase, but the scoreboard pressure created by Hyderabad’s massive total got the better of them in the end.

And that is what will have rival teams, from defending champions Chennai Super Kings to current leaders Rajasthan Royals, worried more than anything else. Unless they’re able to find a way to stop the Sunrisers batting juggernaut, Cummins and Co might just end up bulldozing their way to glory.