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Pune aim for revenge against Chargers
Having lost to Deccan Chargers at home last week, Pune Warriors will look to extract revenge when the two teams square off in an Indian Premier League match in Cuttack on Tuesday.
The Sourav Ganguly-led Warriors are currently placed at No. 7 in the points table, with just four wins out of the nine and the team would like to put its campaign back on track against table-trailers Chargers.
The bowling troika of Marlon Samuels, Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Rahul Sharma looked ordinary against Chargers at the Subrata Roy Sahara Stadium. However, Pune can take some heart from the performance of Ashish Nehra and South African import Alfanso Thomas.
Thomas has particularly been impressive with the ball conceding just over six runs an over in the three matches he has played for the Warriors so far.
Nehra, on the other hand, has looked good in patches, but his inability to strike early in the last few games have raised concerns in the Pune camp.
Uthappa, Smith have been consistent for Pune
The form of leg-spinner Rahul Sharma is also a matter of worry for the visitors and with Ashok Dinda still nursing a side strain the Pune attack wears a rather depleted look.
Their batsmen have been performing well, but the team would want its top-order to be more consistent.Jesse Ryder has amassed 224 runs in the tournament so far, courtesy his 86-run knock against Delhi Daredevils and another 73 against Chennai Super Kings, but in the rest of the matches the New Zealander has struggled to get going.
The skipper also hasn't wielded his bat to much of an effect with 41 being his highest.Samuels and Manish Pandey, too, have not been able to prove their worth so far.
The only consistent performance for the Warriors has come from Robin Uthappa and Australian recruit Steven Smith.
DC has no realistic chance of making it to the semis
Chargers, on the other hand, have not succeeded in giving their campaign a right direction and their dismal performance against Mumbai Indians has not done any good to their depleting morale.
Even the decision of skipper Kumar Sangakkara to drop himself for the Mumbai tie did not have any bearing on the team's results.
Led by Dayle Steyn in the bowling department, they tried their best to take the fight to Mumbai after just scoring 100 with the bat in their previous match, but their overall ability has come under question.
The team has no realistic chance of making it to the last four after losing six matches out of the eight they have played so far but they can definitely be the 'party poopers' for the other teams.
The Teams (from):
Pune Warriors: Sourav Ganguly (Capt), Ashok Dinda, Callum Ferguson, Raiphi Gomez, Harpreet Singh, Dheeraj Jadhav, Kamran Khan, Murali Kartik, Harshad Khadiwale, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Nathan McCullum, Anustup Majumdar, Mithun Manhas, Angelo Mathews, Ashish Nehra, Manish Pandey, Jesse Ryder, Marlon Samuels, Rahul Sharma, Steven Smith, Tamim Iqbal, Alfonso Thomas, Robin Uthappa, Shrikant Wagh, Luke Wright.
Deccan Chargers: Kumar Sangakkara (Capt), Shikhar Dhawan, Parthiv Patel (wk), Cameron White, Jean-Paul Duminy, Ishank Jaggi, Ankit Sharma, Dale Steyn, Amit Mishra, Anand Rajan, Veer Pratap Singh, Chris Lynn, Daniel Christian, Daniel Harris, Juan Theron, Abhishek Jhunjhunwala, Ahmed Quadri, Akash Bhandari, Akshat Reddy, Arjun Yadav, Ashish Reddy, Atchuta Rao, Bharat Chipli, Biplab Samantray, Dwaraka Ravi Teja, Manpreet Gony, Sneha Kishore, Sunny Sohal, Tanmay Mishra, Tanmay Srivastava, Taduri Prakash Sudhindra.