Punjab Kings v Gujarat Titans Tips: Dhawan to do the damage again

• Gujarat suffered a shock loss on Sunday to KKR

• Shikhar Dhawan in excellent form

• Khan and Singh could be good for a couple of wickets

Thursday April 13, 15:00
TV: Live on Sky Sports

Punjab Team News

Punjab were soundly beaten defending just 143/9 against SRH on Sunday. That they had a total of sorts to defend was purely down to a brilliant 99 off 66 from skipper Shikhar Dhawan.

That this effort was deemed worthy of giving Dhawan the man-of-the-match award despite him ending up on the losing side, tells its own story.

But the jury is out as to whether this was a blip after winning their first two games or a sign of things to come.

Dhawan has been his usual reliable self at the top of the order, Nathan Ellis and Arshdeep Singh have taken wickets and kept the economy rate reasonable, but no-one else has stood out.

The obvious change is to bring in Kagiso Rabada and strengthen the fast bowling department even further. It seems odd to have the man who has been just about the best bowler in the IPL over the past four seasons on the sidelines while players with virtually no IPL experience like Matt Short and Sikandar Raza get a game.

Raza is on borrowed time with few contributions of note in three games, but they may give him one more go after showing such great form over the last year or so.

Possible XISingh, Dhawan, Sharma, Raza, Curran, Shahrukh Khan, Brar, Rabada, Chahar, Ellis, Singh.

Gujarat Team news

Gujarat could have played the last 10 minutes of that match against KKR 100 times and won 99 of them. They were after all matched at 1.01 on the Exchange for plenty of money defending a big total with KKR right where they wanted them.

As they used to say on Question of Sport: what happened next?

Well, they had 31 to defend off the last over, gave it to Yash Dayal and saw him concede a single off the first ball. They then saw him being hit for five sixes in a row by Rinku Singh, in what was arguably the most unlikely chase in IPL history.

Credit to Singh but that was not a pretty final over to have been bowled and it will surely haunt Dayal for the rest of the tournament.

Up to that point they did all the hard work: a superb 63 off 24 from the unlikely source of Vijay Shankar and a fine 53 from Sai Sudharsan got them to a big total before Rashid Khan put them in a winning position after taking a hat-trick. Before 'that' over.

But they're still looking good, are two from three and will surely welcome back skipper Hardik Pandya, whose cool head they missed in the death overs, although stand-in skipper Rashid Khan did his best to calm down his bowler himself.

Possible XI Saha, Gill, Sudharsan, Pandya, Shankar, Miller, Tewatia, Khan, Joseph, Shami, Little

Pitch report

We're at Mohali for this one, where Punjab posted 191/5 against KKR on April 1, eventually winning by 7 runs via DLS.

The score was a fair bit above the average first innings score there (165.5) and not in line with the bias for chasing. Just 42.9% of teams batting first go on to win here. But then again, 178.9 is the average first innings winning score here so those extra 25 runs or so obviously made all the difference.

Having won batting here first last week, Punjab may decide they want to do the same again.

After what happened on Sunday, Gujarat will probably be keen to chase.

How to play

Gujarat are slight favourites at 1.910/11. Had they won as they should have on Sunday, that would probably have been about 1.758/11.

They're the defending champs and can be excused one bad day at the office against a side with quite a bit to worry about and largely reliant on Dhawan's runs to remain competitive.

You'll see far worse bets than that 1.910/11 on the Titans this week, whether they bat first or chase.

Punjab Top Batsman

It may just be that Dhawan has decided he's going to have to do it all by himself.

A bit like with David Warner at Delhi, he may have realised he may have to bat deeper and slightly more cautiously given he's surrounded by out-of-form batsmen low on confidence.

If he (or Warner) can hang around until at least the 16th or 17thover then they'll surely have 60-odd runs to their name and can kick on at the end (as Dhawan did on Sunday) or hope a couple of batsmen play useful cameos around them.

It may not be the best strategy for the team to have a low strike rate but it's a good strategy for a top batsman bet.

One that has come um trumps in the past with the likes of Virat Kohli or KL Rahul.

Not that Dhawan's strategy is the be all and end all. With 6469 runs only Kohli has more than him in the history of the IPL and only Warner (57) has more fifties than his 49. No-one has scored more fours than his 728.

So lots to like about him, including his recent form that's gone: 40, 86 not out and 99 not out. For good measure's been boosted to 7/2 from 11/4.

Khan/Singh special at 3/1

In the #Oddsonthat section, one bet that caught the eye was the 3/1 that Rashid Khan and Arshdeep Singh each take two wickets.

Khan has looked very much back to hid best this last year, playing huge roles for Gujarat, Trent Rockets and Lahore in winning the IPL, Hundred and PSL in the process for those sides.

He's got eight wickets three games so far, including that hat-trick and should be good for a couple more here.

Arshdeep would have come good in that respect (2 wickets or more) in two of his three games so far, having taken 3,2 and 1 wicket in those games.

His IPL career strike rate of 17.78 is very decent already and will surely get better as he keeps on improving.

Whether Rabada plays or not, Singh will surely bowl at the death anyway, another advantage.