Sunrisers Hyderabad is one of the strongest teams in the ongoing season of Indian Premier League (IPL). After having started with victories, they suffered a few losses in between. But they didn’t take much time to bounce back. However, they won their last game against Kings XI Punjab comfortably and currently in a good position to qualify for the playoffs. However, their captain Kane Williamson thinks that there are lots of work to be done before they can think about the final.
“We’ll take it one game at a time. We’ve got depth in the squad and we’ll be calling on that and there’s a lot of hard work to go before we talking about finals,” Kane Williamson said at the post-match presentation.
However, there wins came largely on the back of their opening partnership between David Warner and Jonny Bairstow. But the team will not get the service of them fro now onwards as they left for their respective countries for the preparation of the upcoming World Cup. Williamson shared that it wouldn’t be possible to replace them but he backed the bench strength as well.
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“Warner and Bairstow have been world class for us and it will be very hard to fill their boots. But as a team, we’ll have to pick up the slack. There are some guys on the sidelines raring to go. No doubt there will be some changes with guys leaving and they’ll be excited to get on the park,” said Williamson.
“I guess throughout the season you’re looking for points and we’re now in crunch time. This was a big game for us and we put out what was close to a complete performance. It was a really good performance all-round. Obviously we lost to Kings XI the last time so we knew were in for a tough match. One of the biggest positives was our fielding performance. We pride ourselves on that and it will be important going into the final part of the tournament,” Williamson further added.
On the other hand, Kings XI Punjab skipper Ravichandran Ashwin admitted that his side had been ‘completely outplayed’ by Hyderabad.
“It’s not right to think about what’s happened in the past. It’s important to stay in the present. Today is one of those days where we were just completely outplayed, which hasn’t happened this season,” said Ashwin.
“I thought we started really poorly in the Powerplay but we pulled it back in the end. If you see through the tournament, we have been struggling to chase anything above 190. That’s probably a balance issue,” he said further
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However, the skipper is still hopeful for the win in their next games.
“It’s straightforward: we have to keep winning at this stage in the IPL. It didn’t happen today but we have to keep our chin up. There’s a lot of young energy in the team. We had Prabhsimran Singh playing today. They’ve all got great ability and we’re not going quietly, we will keep sticking our necks out,” he added.
