New Delhi:
Delhi Daredevils (DD) will clash with resurgent Rising Pune Supergiant (RPS) at Feroz Shah Kotla ground in an Indian Premier League 2017 match on Friday to halt their rivals juggernaut. The RPS have emerged as the other dominating side alongside Mumbai Indians with seven wins out of eight games. With this encounter, the Pune squad will look to ensure a play-off berth in the tournament.
Pune have 16 points, but aren't entirely safe because of an inferior net run rate. They need to win at least one of their two remaining games to guarantee qualification to the play-offs. Should they lose both, and Kings XI Punjab and Sunrisers win their remaining matches, Pune will be knocked out. Unless Kolkata Knight Riders lose their final game, Pune will need to win both their remaining games to finish in a coveted top-two spot.
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Delhi Daredevils, who are out of the play-off race, will be keen to make the most of their remaining two games in the competition. The result in Kanpur showed Daredevils could have got a lot more out of their campaign if they had won more key moments in the previous outings. One day they were chasing 200 plus targets with ease and on another day, they were being bowled for less than 70.
Their talented batting line-up comprising Iyer, Karun Nair, Sanju Samson and Rishabh Pant have not been able to fire consistently as a unit, leading to their downfall. Even captain Zaheer Khan was at pains to explain Daredevils' erratic performance this season after a sensational win over Lions in Kanpur.
Champions Trophy bound Mohammed Shami's performance in the remaining games will be keenly watched as he has not been at his best after returning from injury.
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Squads
Delhi Daredevils: Zaheer Khan(C), Angelo Mathews, Corey Anderson, Kagiso Rabada, Pat Cummins, Ankit Bawne, Aditya Tare, Murugan Ashwin, Navdeep Saini, Shashank Singh, Mohammed Shami, Shahbaz Nadeem, Jayant Yadav, Amit Mishra, Shreyas Iyer, Sanju Samson, Chris Morris, Carlos Brathwaite, Karun Nair, Rishabh Pant, Chama Milind, Khaleel Ahmed, Pratyush Singh, Marlon Samuels
Rising Pune Supergiant: Steve Smith (C), Ajinkya Rahane, Mahendra Singh Dhoni, Ashok Dinda, Mayank Agarwal, Faf du Plessis, Ankit Sharma, Baba Aparajith, Ankush Bains, Rajat Bhatia, Deepak Chahar, Rahul Chahar, Dan Christian, Lockie Ferguson, Imran Tahir, Jaskaran Singh, Usman Khawaja, Saurabh Kumar, Ben Stokes, Washington Sundar, Milind Tandon, Manoj Tiwary, Adam Zampa, Jaydev Unadkat, Ishwar Pandey, Rahul Tripathi and Shardul Thakur
(With inputs from PTI)
