Toss Punjab Kings chose to bowl vs Sunrisers Hyderabad

Punjab Kings captain Shreyas Iyer won the toss and had no hesitation to bowl first against Sunrisers Hyderabad. Shashank Singh, who changed the match with his bowling when these two teams last played, came in replacing the out-of-form Nehal Wadhera. Fast bowler Lockie Ferguson also made an appearance in place of Xavier Bartlett. Priyansh Arya wasn’t named in PBKS’ bowling-first XI but is likely to come in as the Impact Player.

“The surface looks beautiful. There hasn’t been a single piece of grass since the time I have seen it,” Iyer said on his decision to bowl.

SRH captain Pat Cummins wasn’t too fussed about losing the toss. “I can’t read pitches – they all seem to be high-scoring here,” he said. SRH made one change to their side, bringing in a fit-again Nitish Kumar Reddy in place of Aniket Verma.

SRH could bring in either left-arm spinner Harsh Dubey or a seamer as their Impact Player.

PBKS are coming into the game on the back of two losses, after being unbeaten for the first seven games of the season. SRH are also coming off a loss, having gone down to Kolkata Knight Riders before winning five in a row. The last time SRH and PBKS met was nearly a month ago in New Chandigarh, when fifties from Prabhsimran Singh, Priyansh Arya and Shreyas Iyer helped PBKS chase down 220 in 18.5 overs.

If PBKS win tonight, they will extend their reign at the top of the table, inching closer to a playoff spot. If SRH win, they will displace PBKS at the summit.

Punjab Kings: 1 Prabhsimran Singh (wk), 2 Cooper Connolly, 3 Shreyas Iyer (capt), 4 Shashank Singh, 5 Suryansh Shedge, 6 Marcus Stoinis, 7 Marco Jansen, 8 Lockie Ferguson, 9 Vijaykumar Vyshak, 10 Arshdeep Singh, 11 Yuzvendra Chahal

Impact Player bench: Priyansh Arya, Harpreet Brar, Xavier Bartlett, Musheer Khan, Vishnu Vinod

Sunrisers Hyderabad: 1 Abhishek Sharma, 2 Travis Head, 3 Ishan Kishan (wk), 4 Heinrich Klaasen, 5 Salil Arora, 6 R Smaran, 7 Nitish Kumar Reddy, 8 Pat Cummins (capt), 9 Shivang Kumar, 10 Eshan Malinga, 11 Sakib Hussain

Impact Player bench: Aniket Verma, Praful Hinge, Liam Livingstone, Harshal Patel, Harsh Dubey