Perth will take on Adelaide in the Monday encounter of Australia T20 League 2020-21 to eye first win of the season. Adelaide have won two matches out of four and sitting at the middle of the table.
Match Timings: Dec 28, 1:45 PM IST
Team Preview
Perth are winless in the tournament after three matches. After sharing points with Melbourne-S in a rain-affected fixture, Perth lost to Sydney-T by 7 wickets in Canberra. They have been outplayed in both defeats by the opponents. The early blows hurt Perth in the first innings but they managed to post 152, after Mitchell Marsh’s 52 and Bancroft’s 34. Sydney chased down this total through the skipper’s brilliant knock. Perth took the control of the game by picking two wickets on 34 but Ferguson crossed the line for Sydney with a good partnership with Ben Cutting.
In both defeats, Perth batted first and didn’t post a strong total. They haven’t won a single match yet and earned two points from three matches. They are lacking in consistency. In the first game, they bowled out on 130, and in the second game, they slipped in the death-overs after a fluent start. Munro got runs against Melbourne-S and Marsh got a half-century in the previous game. Perth can form confidence in batting through these positives. Turner would have to try bowling too in middle-overs to complete the 6th bowling option.
Meanwhile, Adelaide have a mixed campaign so far with two wins and two defeats. In the previous game, they held the nerves against Brisbane after an excellent bowling display. The batting was not up to the mark for them but they scored 150 on board and none of the Adelaide batsmen showed positive intent with the bat. The bowlers made the task pretty easy and they picked Adelaide’s 8 wickets on just 68. Peirson and Mujeeb added quick 60 runs to put Brisbane on top but Peirson couldn’t finish the game and fell short of just two runs. Danny Briggs bagged three and the duo Siddle and Rashid picked two wickets each.
Before this defeat, Adelaide lost to the defending champions by 38 runs. Adelaide have the best opportunity to top the table. If they get all four points from this game, they will upstage Sydney-S from the top spot and in case of three points, they will be at the second spot. Adelaide is building its strength and they have got three Bash Boost Points which helped them to boost its points-table game. Perth are the underdogs here and they have to play the best game on Monday to stun Adelaide. It would be a cracker game of cricket.
Pitch Report
Adelaide Oval is a batting-friendly wicket but it has a good amount of help to pacers. The new ball will be crucial and chasing would be a good idea after winning the toss. 160-170 should be a good total while batting first.
Possible XI
Perth-S
Jason Roy, Liam Livingstone, Colin Munro, Ashton Turner (c), Mitchell Marsh, Josh Inglis (wk), Jhye Richardson, Aaron Hardie, Fawad Ahmed, Jason Behrendroff, Andrew Tye
Adelaide-S
Jake Weatherald, Phil Salt, Matt Renshaw, Alex Carey (c&wk), Jono Wells, Matt Short, Rashid Khan/Harry Conway, Daniel Worrall, Wes Agar, Peter Siddle, Danny Briggs
Key Players
Perth-S
Liam Livingstone
Last 7 matches – Runs: 241, Avg: 34.43, SR: 128.88
Jhye Richardson
Last 10 matches – W: 11, Eco: 6.20, SR: 18.91
Adelaide-S
Matt Renshaw
Australia T20 League (last season) – M: 14, Runs: 348, SR: 129.85
Jonathan Wells
Australia T20 League (last season) – M: 15, Runs: 478, SR: 135.41
Previous outing: 36 (38)
