The Lahore Lions journey has been quite glitch so far in the Champions League T20 but the Pakistan National T20 champions are determined to stun the heavyweights Chennai Super Kings in the forthcoming encounter in Bangalore.
The Lions looked determined to clinch a victory but it is not going to be a walk in the park for them as beating Super Kings is no joke. Seeing their performance in the last game against the Kolkata Knight Riders – chances are quite bleak.
Lahore’s batting looked clueless against the spinners and were quite sloppy on the field as well. The Super Kings might not have Sunil Narine in their sleeves, but off-spinner Ravichandran Ashwin and Ravindra Jadeja are more than capable of troubling the batsmen.
“If we win the game tomorrow, which we are really determined to, there will be pressure on CSK and KKR, as they have to play two more games each,” the Lions pacer Wahab Riaz said. “It’s still a very open group and a good, healthy net run-rate will come in handy.”
The Super Kings batsmen were at their dazzling best in the last game against the Dolphins and posted a mammoth 242 runs total. Their bowlers, however, looked oblivious despite having a mammoth total to defend.
Riaz claimed that unlike Dolphins they have a better bowling attack and playing them will be a different ball game altogether for Chennai’s star-studded batting line up.
“CSK played really well and scored 240-odd runs but the Dolphins fought back to get close to 190 themselves,” Riaz said. “We have a better bowling attack and it is going to be a different game between us and CSK.”
More than batting and bowling, the Lions are concerned about their shoddy fielding, which let them down in the last game against the Knight Riders. They dropped crucial catches and failed to end on a winning note, despite clinching wickets at the end.
Riaz acknowledged the fact that their fielding is not up to the standards, but insisted that the senior players in the team are trying their best to inject confidence in the youngsters to not crumble under pressure in crunch games.
“We know we have been collapsing in the field a lot and we are trying our best to overcome that,” Riaz said. “Most of our guys are new to this arena; they haven’t played in such high-octane games before and there is pressure on them. We, senior players, are working hard with them and giving them as much confidence as we can.”
