Dewald Brevis is recovering from a side injury, and while he had a long net, he only faced throw downs and barely did more than defending the ball. It seems unlikely he’ll be back. Without him, CSK’s middle order appears vulnerable again. CSK’s IPL opener was their first without MS Dhoni or Suresh Raina in the XI. The one on Friday will be the third time they play at Chepauk without Dhoni.
Chennai Super Kings: 1 Sanju Samson (wk), 2 Ruturaj Gaikwad (capt), 3 Ayush Mhatre, 4 Matt Short, 5 Shivam Dube, 6 Sarfaraz Khan/Prashant Veer, 7 Kartik Sharma, 8 Jamie Overton, 9 Noor Ahmed, 10 Matt Henry, 11 Anshul Kamboj, 12 Khaleel Ahmed
“No break,” said PBKS assistant coach Brad Haddin, when asked about Shreyas’ hand, which took a blow while standing at the non-strikers’ end in the last game. Ricky Ponting said PBKS had strengthened from the time they finished as IPL finalists last year. Considering the success of Cooper Connolly – and even without it, the mere fact that he was batting at No. 3, displacing Shreyas who had such great success there (360 runs at an average of 51.42 and strike rate of 180.9) – was proof of the good work they had done at the auction table. They have batting down to No. 8, and seven bowling options if Connolly and Marcus Stoinis can bowl.
Punjab Kings: 1 Priyansh Arya, 2 Prabhsimran Singh (wk), 3 Cooper Connolly, 4 Shreyas Iyer (capt), 5 Nehal Wadhera, 6 Shashank Singh, 7 Marcus Stoinis, 8 Marco Jansen, 9 Xavier Bartlett, 10 Vijaykumar Vyshak, 11 Arshdeep Singh, 12 Yuzvendra Chahal
