With both teams from the top half of the points table set to a take the field on April 27, Feroz Shah Kotla can expect to witness a well fought encounter on Wednesday evening. Both teams - Gujarat Lions and Delhi Daredevils - have lost one game each and will be looking to carry their momentum forward.

The Suresh Raina-led visitors boast of some of the finest names in T20 cricket like Dwayne Bravo, Brendon McCullum, Ravindra Jadeja, James Faulkner, besides the captain himself. They will be riding on the confidence of having beaten Royal Challengers Bangalore in a thrilling chase in Rajkot. As they go into this match, the availability of Aaron Finch, who has played a crucial role for the team in their earlier matches, is fifty-fifty, said coach Brad Hodge while speaking to the media ahead of practice. Speaking about his team’s performance, Hodge said, “We’ve got a lot of match-winners. If a couple of those fire in any particular game it’s going to be awfully hard for any opposition. We just have to make sure that this consistency keeps going across the tournament. We’ve certainly identified that losing is also part of the tournament. You can’t expect to go through the whole tournament winning every game. We had a really poor outing against SRH (Sunrisers Hyderabad), put that to bed, and across the board played strong cricket (in the previous match).” Asked what he tells his team having witnessed teams peak early in the league phase and fade later, he replied, “I guess you’re referring to Rajasthan Royals (who Hodge was a part of) where we’ve started off well many times and faded at the end. I think the difference between that team and this one is that at RR, it always took a hundred percent effort and our best cricket to win every match. The effort was intense to make sure we got to the finals. I think in this particular side we have so many match-winners that I guess we can take games away from certain teams in a matter of moments or a couple of overs. The effort stretched across a full tournament can be marginally less. I know you can run out of gas at the end of the tournament. Hopefully my knowledge will help make sure that doesn’t happen.” When they take on the hosts, the Lions will be up against DD’s leg-spinners who have played a key role in the home team’s success. Asked about the Lions considering strengthening their top-order with left-handed batsmen in a bid to negotiate the spin twins, the coach said, “We have plenty of good left-handers who can play spin there. Plenty!” Speaking about the way the two teams stack up, given that the Lions have a more experienced line-up, Hodge said, “There are a couple of big name players in our line-up for sure and certainly experience does help. But, I’ve played with a lot of these guys from DD (before) and they are very talented cricketers.”

Besides playing alongside some of the DD players, Hodge has also played with mentor Rahul Dravid and under the guidance of DD coach, Paddy Upton. Speaking about out-thinking the men behind the scenes who are charting DD’s success, he said “I see Rahul very much as a role model and mentor also for myself. We’ve played together and I learnt a lot of things off him. I respect everything he does in life. It will be nice to be able to beat him and his team. I’m sure he’s thinking that way as well, we have a few RR players in our side – Faulkner, Dhawal Kulkarni, etc. It is a mixture of interesting feelings. There is a lot of love and friendship with a lot of those guys and that will continue forever in time. But once you jump across that battlefield it’s the best man wins, I guess.”