Indian Premier League’s two newest franchises, Rising Pune Supergiant will take on the Gujarat Lions on Monday night at the Maharashtra Cricket Association Stadium in Pune. While RPS are currently fourth on the table after a string of good performances, the Gujarat Lions are placed sixth and will be hunting for a win to stay in contention for the playoffs. However, Pune have never defeated Gujarat so far in the IPL, with the Lions winning all three games between the two.

After an initial hiccough, Steve Smith’s and Co have won four of their last five matches, making it five wins out of nine matches. In their last match, Pune thrashed Royal Challengers Bangalore by 61 runs, after restricting the storied RCB batting lineup to 96 for 9 in a chase of 158.

Gujarat, on the other hand, have only three wins from nine matches this season, and are coming from a heart-breaking Super Over loss against Mumbai Indians. After putting in a solid show to take the match to the Super Over, the combined batting firepower of Brendon McCullum and Aaron Finch failed in the face of Jasprit Bumrah and Suresh Raina’s team fell short.

Time: 8 pm

Venue: MCA Stadium, Pune

TV: Sony Max, Sony Six, Sony ESPN and their HD channels

Head-to-Head since 2016

Played: 3

Gujarat: 3

Pune: 0

Rising Pune Supergiant

  • Pune’s MVP Ben Stokes had to miss a couple of matches due to an injured shoulder, but he is fit again and is likely to be available for selection. However, Lockie Ferguson has impressed on his last outing as well, and Steve Smith will have a choice to make.
  • Pune will be slightly concerned with Ajinkya Rahane’s form, who has failed to score big after his half-century in the season opener against Mumbai Indians. He has scored 211 runs in nine matches so far, at an average of 23.44 which is nowhere near enough for a top order batsman.
  • Rahiul Tripathi, Rahane’s opening partner, on the hand has had an impressive IPL season so far, notching six consecutive scores of more than 30 – an IPL record. The young batsman will be hoping to make that seven and score big against Gujarat. 

Rising Pune Supergiant squad: Steve Smith (capt), Ajinkya Rahane, Mahendra Singh Dhoni (WK), Ashok Dinda, Faf du Plessis, Mayank Agarwal, 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, Shardul Thakur.

“Lockie Ferguson bowled beautifully. It’s a magnificent effort from Lockie, hit good lengths and bowled good bouncers as well. He is an exciting player for the future.” – RPS captain Steve Smith after the win over RCB.

Gujarat Lions

  • Gujarat Lions bowler Andrew Tye, who had taken a hat-trick in the last match between the two teams, is ruled out of the rest of this season after dislocating his shoulder in the match against Mumbai Indians. He was stretchered off the ground after he fell on his left shoulder while diving for a ball at the boundary. 
  • Gujarat’s all rounder Ravindra Jadeja holds an edge over Pune captain Steve Smith, having got his wicket four times in nine innings in the IPL so far. Considering the fact that no other bowler has dismissed Smith more than twice, Jadeja will be relishing the contest.
  • Captain Suresh Raina is Gujarat’s highest run-getter this season with 301 runs, but has got more than fifty only twice and he will be keen to post a big score very soon. 

Gujarat Lions squad: Suresh Raina (Captain), Akshadeep Nath, Shubham Agarwal, Basil Thampi, Dwayne Smith, Chirag Suri, James Faulkner, Aaron Finch, Manpreet Gonly, Ishan Kishan, Ravindra Jadeja, Shadab Jakati, Dinesh Karthik, Dhaval Kulkarni, Praveen Kumar, Brandon McCullum, Pradeep Sangwan, Jason Roy, Jaydev Shah, Shelly Shaurya, Nathusingh, Tejas Baroka and Andrew Tye.

The shoulder popped out of the socket and remained out for a while. They put it back in at the hospital. The extent of the damage is still unknown. I will be flying home in the next couple of days to figure that out. And as for the recovery time, I am not too sure at the moment, but hopefully it’s not too long. – Andrew Tye, the third highest wicket-taker this IPL.