IPL, SRH season analysis: Tournament to forget for Sunrisers Hyderabad

Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) endured yet another underwhelming Indian Premier League (IPL) campaign, finishing at a lowly 10^th place with just four wins out of 14 matches.

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Much was expected from SRH after spending an immense amount of money on Harry Brook, but the Aiden Markram-led side faltered under pressure to finish on the wrong end of the table.

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Where did it all go wrong for SRH?

There were a lot of expectations from SRH’s costliest recruit in England’s Harry Brook. Brook was acquired for Rs 13.25 crore at the IPL player auction in Kochi last year, but he failed to live upto his price tag this season.

Barring a century against Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) at the Eden Gardens, Brook doesn’t have much to celebrate. In fact, in his last 10 IPL matches, Brook endured single-figure scores on six occasions. Now, that’s not a good reading if you’re a SRH fan.

On the whole, SRH batters failed to fire as a collective unit, and that let them down big time. Mayank Agarwal scored his only fifty of the season against MI in SRH’s final match on Sunday, while Rahul Tripathi also struggled for consistency.

Chopping and changing the top-order too did not work either. SRH had seven different opening pairs this season, but looked unsettled altogether.

To add to their collective woes, none of the SRH bowlers made it to the top 10 wicket takers list. The closest was Bhuvneshwar Kumar, who was in 12^th place with 16 wickets. SRH’s next best bowler was Mayank Markande (12 scalps). And Washington Sundar’s hamstring injury midway through the tournament did not help their case either.

Another disappointment has been that of Umran Malik. Umran Malik had a dream run in IPL 2022, picking 22 wickets from 14 games, but this season, his limited opportunities left everyone surprised. In eight matches, the pacer picked up just five wickets. Against MI on Sunday, Umran struggled to put up a disciplined effort, conceding 41 runs off three overs without taking a wicket.

SRH skipper Aiden Markram, though, had a rather bizarre reply when asked about Umran.

“Not too sure to be honest (about Umran). Certainly, he’s a player with the X factor, bowls at 150kph, but I don’t really (know) about behind the scenes but he has a lot of X factor,” Markram had said.

What were SRH’s positives?

Heinrich Klaasen. Klaasen ended up as SRH’s top run-getter this season, with 448 runs from 12 matches at a strike-rate of 177. He bolstered SRH’s batting when they needed the most, and went on to notch a century as well as two fifties.

Another positive for SRH was Mayank Markande. Markande got game time regularly and made full use of it, collecting 12 wickets from 10 matches. He finished with an economy rate of 7.89, as well as ending as SRH’s second best bowler this season, after Bhuvneshwar Kumar.

Barring Klaasen and Markande, there weren’t much of positives to talk about for SRH in what was a forgettable season for the Orange Army altogether.

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