Sunrisers Hyderabad's Jaydev Unadkat, right, celebrates with his teammates after winning the Indian Premier League match aganist Kolkata Knight Riders in Kolkata, India, on Thursday, April 2, 2026.(AP Photo/ Bikas Das)
Coming into the tournament, Sunrisers Hyderabad’s bowling was under scrutiny, but as the tournament started and is in progress, the attack has shown more and more flaws. In the game against the Punjab Kings on Saturday, defending 220 runs, the side looked clueless. Although spinners Shivang Kumar and Harsh Dubey did a decent job, the rest of the bowling looked toothless. Speaking about SRH’s vulnerable bowling attack, former Indian selector Kris Srikkanth said SRH need to score 500 runs to win.
“They have no scope with their bowling. The opposition will chase down even 300 against their bowling. Their two young spinners, Harsh Dubey and Shivang Kumar, are good. But their bowling starts and ends there. Eshan Malinga will get smashed straight to Colombo with his bowling, yet, SRH is playing him,” Srikkanth said on his YouTube channel.
“It’s time over for Jaydev Unadkat and Harshal Patel. SRH can win only if they score 500 with this bowling attack. You can’t do anything with this bowling. It’s not even up to the level of the first division,” he added.
Shreyas Iyer was awarded Player Of the Match for his 33-ball 69. Srikkanth lauded Iyer and said: “PBKS have a fantastic captain, and one that shows a lot of responsibility. He just came in and easily won the game for them with his batting. Everyone is playing at a 200+ strike rate. It is impossible to beat them if they all play at this strike rate,” said Srikkanth
“I think in the middle, we could have ended up with a total of 250 at least the way we got started. But, the things happen. We did not end up getting those runs. But at the same time, they did actually bat well in the beginning and they also had the powerplay on their side. But at the same time, I feel we were not so good with the execution. Like I said earlier, in T20 cricket, the most important thing is execution of your good balls. So we were not that great today. (what was par on that?) Par, to be very honest, I thought 219 was a good total anyway because we started in a very good manner, we thought we could end up getting 240,” said SRH stand-in skipper Ishan Kishan.
