Indian Premier League - IPL / Tobias Gourlay / 12 March 2010 /

Shane Warne's IPL 2008 champions take on the pre-tournament favourites. Tobias Gourlay thinks the atmosphere's right for a choke.

Venue Conditions

In Monday's only match the Rajasthan Royals play host to the Delhi Daredevils at the Sardar Patel Stadium in Ahmedabad, which is in Gujarat rather than Rajasthan, but so it goes.

This is the new 48,000-capacity stadium's first IPL game. In one of the two previous matches played there the Delhi Daredevils' AB de Villiers scored a 59-ball century as South Africa made 365 and beat a weakened India team at the end of their recent ODI series.
Team News

Shane Warne, 40, is still king in Rajasthan. The three other foreigners he used in the Royals' first match were Dmitri Mascarenhas, Graeme Smith and Shaun Tait, but the star of a narrow defeat to the Mumbai Indians was Yusuf Pathan, whose 37-ball hundred was the second-fastest in the Twenty20 history. Undistinguished performances from the other Royals have brought Munaf Patel, Morne Morkel and Adam Voges into contention for a place in Monday's team.

Ashish Nehra picked up an injury the day before Delhi's first game of the tournament - a five-wicket win over Kings XI Punjab - and it's not clear that he'll be ready to return for this match. In his absence, Sri Lankan allrounder Farveez Maharoof stepped up and took important wickets.

DD - Wayne Parnell

Match Odds

The Royals are plotting world domination through a series of pacts with clubs around the world, but the calibre of some of their new overseas recruits - Michael Lumb, Damien Martyn, Adam Voges - suggests they will not make a serious assault on IPL 2010, and duly they are [2.5] outsiders for this match, even though they have won two of four previous matches with Delhi.

The Daredevils are [4.8] favourites to win the tournament and [1.65] favourites for this match. Read as a list of talented hitters, Gautam Gambhir, Tillakaratne Dilshan, Virender Sehwag, AB de Villiers and David Warner looks impressive. Read as a batting line-up, it looks top-heavy. They need a Neil Fairbrother. They have a Paul Collingwood - the Paul Collingwood, in fact - but he's not around for another week or so.

They've been favourites before and choked. Is Gambhir going to be a better captain than Sehwag? Nobody knows yet, even if his first innings as captain was indeed a captain's innings (see below).

Top Runscorer

The Royals' top run-scorer from IPL 2009, Ravindra Jadeja, is banned this season for trying to cash in on that status. Shane Watson, top run-scorer from their successful IPL 2008, isn't available until the end of March. As Voges becomes available, the two frontline batsmen most sure of their places are Graeme Smith, who seemed well-recovered from recent injuries in making 26 against Mumbai, and, of course, Pathan. Paras Dogra's 41 was the only other noteworthy contribution

Chasing a small total last time out, most of Delhi's much-vaunted top-order failed. Captain Gambhir scored more than half of the 143 they required in a sensibly paced 72, but de Villiers' previous on this ground makes him worthy of consideration.

Another Market

Anyone can hit a six in Twenty20 (this column even saw Alastair Cook do it for Essex at the Oval last season), but some do it more often than others. Delhi are [1.72] favourites to hit more of them than Rajasthan and rightly so - Sehwag, de Villiers and Dilshan are all eminently capable six-hitters, while Rajasthan batsmen are not so obviously keen to go over the top. If Rajasthan are to win, they don't need to outblast their opponents; rather, the victory's more likely to come through Warne's captaincy, Smith's unflappability and a good bowling performance from either Tait or Morkel.

Trivia

Ahmedabad has spent many recent years in the top-10 list of the world's most polluted cities. The textile industry and the petrol tuk-tuks are widely blamed and have forced city authorities to install oxygen points at prominent road junctions. Things are beginning to improve, but the Daredevils are notorious chokers.

Tobias Gourlay Says: Back Rajasthan Royals at [2.5] to beat Delhi Daredevils

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