SRHvsRR: 5 things you might have missed

Day 3 of IPL 2018 was proved to be another damp squib with a very one-sided contest between Rajasthan Royals and Sunrisers Hyderabad. 125 was never going to be enough for Rajasthan Royals to trouble the opposition with Dhawan scoring more than half of the runs by himself and winning the Man of the Match award.

Sportskeeda takes a look at the five unnoticed things from the match which had a considerable effect on the end result of the game for both sides.

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#5 Kane Williamson forgetting Shakib's name at the toss

Not often you would see opposition captains helping each other in a match but it happened today at the toss when Hyderabad skipper Kane Williamson struggled to name his fourth overseas player at the toss.

He tried to look around hoping to catch a glimpse of that player to no avail and it was Rajasthan skipper, Ajinkya Rahane who came to his rescue and uttered Shakib’s name. Kane Williamson sheepishly acknowledged his counterpart’s help and named him to Danny Morrison who evidently looked excited fist pumping them off the interview.

#4 Saving Rashid Khan for Stokes and Buttler

One thing that made Sunrisers Hyderabad stand out amongst teams in the previous editions of IPL was their strategy devised for every opposition batsman. They followed it in today’s match by holding back Rashid Khan for Ben Stokes and at the death overs for Jos Buttler.

The move almost paid dividends with Rashid Khan bowling three successive dot balls, in which he threatened to nip off Stokes in any of those deliveries including a close caught behind shout which they decided not to review.

The most expensive overseas recruit in this edition’s IPL eventually gave his wicket away in the very next over when he tried to launch Stanlake over long on which was caught brilliantly by Kane Williamson. Rashid Khan, however, had success against Jos Buttler castling him for 6 runs at the back end of the innings

#3 Role change for Tripathi

Having amassed 391 runs including a couple of half-centuries at a strike rate of over 146 in the opening slot for Rising Pune Supergiant last year, Rahul Tripathi was surprisingly pushed to the middle order at number 5 with D Arcy Short sharing the opener’s role alongside Rahane.

He was evidently caught between attack and defense falling to Shakib when trying to defend the ball and finishing with almost a run a ball at 17. It looks like Rahul Tripathi will have to settle for a middle order role with Short occupying his preferred slot.

#2 Athletic Rashid Khan

Rashid Khan’s contribution in the match didn’t stop with scalping the prize wicket of Jos Buttler and bowling economical bowlers. He made life miserable for the Royals with his fielding as well.

He took two brilliant catches in the field including those of the Rajasthan side's captain, Ajinkya Rahane and top scorer, Sanju Samson with the latter being more significant and defining than the former.

Stopping the Royals' momentum and initiating the slide for them, Rashid Khan ended with the impressive figures of 4-0-23-1 to go with two catches.

#1 Sandwiching Stanlake

Kane Williamson didn’t do much wrong today apart from forgetting Shakib’s name at the toss. He was brilliant with the bat, playing second fiddle to Shikhar Dhawan coasting his team to victory and also in the field, taking two brilliant catches including that of Ben Stokes.

But what went unnoticed was the way he used his bowlers against particular batsmen. He had separate plans for Indian batsmen and overseas batters by making them face Billy Stanlake and Rashid Khan respectively.

Billy Stanlake finished his spell by the 11th over bowling predominantly to Sanju Samson and Rahane and took the prize wicket of Ben Stokes who tried to up the scoring rate after struggling evidently to Rashid Khan. He finished with the match figures of 4-0-29-1.