The question comes whose fault is this? Aiden Markram didn’t seem to have any say in his team selection, at moment he raised questions about the selection of players.
The coach Brian Lara clearly remained heavily unimpressed with the performance of the team and kept changing players based on their performance in solitary given opportunities.
Everything they tried turned out to be a failure. They used Rahul Tripathi, Harry Brooks, Mayank Agrawal, Anmolpreet Singh and Vivrant Sharma as openers. The best they could extract was three half centuries and one century from these players in 14 matches.
It is not only about their batting, but also, their bowling efforts weren’t good enough to win matches against big teams like Gujarat Titans, Royal Challengers Banglore and Mumbai Indians.
Bhuvneshwar Kumar definitely did a wonderful job for them in initial overs, following him, there was no substantial contribution from other bowlers. The way management used Marco Jansen was absolutely unexplainable.
A definite all rounder, he could have been a pioneer of SRH fast bowling attack but one bad performance cost him place in the team. Similiar was the case with Umran Malik whome Markram called “the X-factor player”, however despite being captain of the team, he didn’t know what was happening in the background.
Mayank Markande was set to become the emerging talent for SRH. On home soil, he was much needed to play in all matches. The Sunrisers management just failed to acknowledge the need of the moment.
A lot of mismanagement and inconsistency justifies where this team has ended in this tournament. They couldn’t find a finisher throughout the tournament, depending on different players to do the job on a given day.
Lack Of Clarification In Players’ Roles
Harry Brook, can’t blame him much about his performance. He’s definitely a top order player, yet the coaches kept messing up with his batting position. The consequence was apparent that he couldn’t flourish.
Heinrich Klaasen, one would think why he wasn’t utilised well. He’s a proper number 3 batter, has played some amzing cricket at international level for Proteas but at SRH, he wasn’t used to his full potential.
Aiden Markram succumbed under the pressure of captaincy. Having no experience of captaining a side in the sub continent, it was just a bitter lesson for him. Can’t blame his for he couldn’t do much with the kind of team he has anyway.
What’s In The Future
The Sunrisers need a new coach who understands potential of players. It must be said that CSK, too, lost their first match and looked so weak in their bowling efforts. However, Fleming did stick with his players, allowing them to settle their nerves.
Having Adil Rashid in your team and not using him in matches is a big blunder. A match or two will no prove worth of such a player, the kind of experience Rashid brings, at some point, he’s going to win SRH big matches.
Either Aiden Markram gets more free as captain or someone else should take over. The importance of not losing his batting charisma is equally important for a player like Markram.