There is one more match taking place in the Indian Premier League on Friday when we head to Lucknow for the IPL 2025 clash between the Royal Challengers Bangalore and the Sunrisers Hyderabad.
This is clearly a much bigger match for the Royal Challengers as they look to move into top spot in the table. The Sunrisers are just playing out time on their campaign and this is the penultimate match of a disappointing season.
Royal Challengers Bangalore
This has been a cracking campaign for the Royal Challengers Bangalore so far and they have the chance to move to the top of the table with a match to play and be in control of securing a top two finish and getting the two bites at reaching the final should they need it. The positive season so far will mean little at the end of it if they don’t get their hands on the trophy for the first time in their history though so the pressure is about to ramp up on them from here on in.
Bangalore have shown their worth with the bat for the majority of the competition but there will be questions over their bowling unit while Josh Hazlewood isn’t around. To be fair, this match being moved from Bangalore to Lucknow because of the weather might not be a bad thing as their attack is likely to get more joy from this pitch than the good batting deck at the Chinnaswamy. That in turn might take some of the pressure off their batters which can be no bad thing.
Sunrisers Hyderabad
We all know that the Sunrisers Hyderabad were billed as the team to beat heading into the tournament because of their aggressive batting style. That was completely understandable but it didn’t really take into account what would happen should that batting flatter to deceive and unfortunately for them they have found out more often than not. That means that their last two matches are just fulfilling fixtures with nothing on them which will be disappointing.
We saw in the last game against the Lucknow Super Giants the good and the bad of the Sunrisers Hyderabad this season. They are underpowered with the ball but they can take down any bowling unit and put up scores which not many can get to. Unfortunately for them they haven’t done the latter enough this term and the former has haunted them throughout the campaign and ultimately that is why their campaign has ended from a competitive standpoint.
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Key Players
Romario Shepherd has skipped the Ireland ODI leg of the West Indies current tour to remain with the Royal Challengers Bangalore and the side will hope that he can propel a total and restrict the opposition throughout this one.
Travis Head has recovered from Covid and is expected to take his place back in the side and with no Josh Hazlewood in the opposing ranks he will be looking to light up the Sunrisers Hyderabad innings right from the outset.
Betting
I am expecting another high scoring match here. It is the default thought process in this competition and while pitches in Lucknow can be a bit tricky, both teams made 200 here in the last game and one of those sides were the Sunrisers Hyderabad so they should know how to build a total. Putting it simply, both these teams look a whole lot better with the bat than they do the ball so whatever the pitch is doing I would expect the runs to flow.
The run line for this one is 361.5 which is fairly high but it is in play of being covered with a first innings score of 180 given that the chasing side has won five of the six matches on this ground this season. Three of those first innings scores were in excess of 180 and another was 171 so although this ground has a reputation for being a graveyard for the batters, we haven’t really seen that in this competition. This will be just the second match here in 31 days so the pitches should play well and with two weak attacks on show it makes sense to back the runs to flow.
Tips
Back Over 361.5 runs for a 3/10 stake at 1.83 with Bet365
