Lucknow – Rishabh Pant called correctly at the toss on Wednesday and, without much hesitation, asked Rajasthan Royals to have first use of a surface that has proved awkward for most visiting sides. Lucknow Super Giants arrive on the back of three successive defeats; Royals have lost their last two. Something has to give, and both skippers spoke of calm adjustments rather than sweeping change.
Team changes first. LSG have handed quick Mayank Yadav his first appearance of the campaign, the 23-year-old replacing Avesh Khan. Leg-spinner Digvesh Rathi also comes in, taking the spot of left-armer M Siddharth. Otherwise Pant keeps faith with an under-performing middle order, notably Nicholas Pooran, who owns just 51 runs from six visits to the crease and the slowest strike-rate of any batter to have faced 50 balls this season.
“Still figuring out what’s best with regards to our team [combination],” Pant admitted. “Last few matches have been challenging. Need to figure out a way to play here on home soil. Mostly it’s about subtle changes, you want to keep the stability.” He doubled down on Pooran: “A player who has shown so much potential, you want to trust him regardless.”
Riyan Parag, leading Royals in a transitional season, seemed unfazed by being sent in. “We’ve batted well, against KKR, made some miscalculations in the middle overs. Message is we need to play 40 overs of good cricket. Hopefully we’ll do that.” The visitors, fourth with eight points from six, can climb to second if they break the losing run. Lucknow, ninth with two wins, could do with a lift in a congested lower half of the table.
Playing XIs
Rajasthan Royals: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Vaibhav Sooryavanshi, Dhruv Jurel (wk), Riyan Parag (capt), Shimron Hetmyer, Donovan Ferreira, Ravindra Jadeja, Jofra Archer, Ravi Bishnoi, Brijesh Sharma, Nandre Burger. Bench: Lhuan-dre Pretorius, Ravi Singh, Yash Raj Punia, Shubham Dubey, Tushar Deshpande.
Lucknow Super Giants: Mitchell Marsh, Ayush Badoni, Rishabh Pant (capt & wk), Nicholas Pooran, Aiden Markram, Mukul Choudhary, Mohammed Shami, Mohsin Khan, Prince Yadav, Digvesh Rathi, Mayank Yadav. Bench: Himmat Singh, George Linde, M Siddharth, Matthew Breetzke, Abdul Samad.
Conditions in Lucknow have produced middling totals, and early seam movement has occasionally turned matches inside the powerplay. With two sides short on recent results, a steady hand – rather than fireworks – might yet decide who emerges from this mini-slump first.
