Big picture: Will the real SRH stand up?
One team is hammering away runs quicker than everyone bar Lucknow Super Giants, while the other has lost more wickets than anyone in the powerplay.
One team is seeing a new batting hero in every game, while the other is looking around for someone to stand up with the bat.
One has the second-best batting average for a team this season, while the other has the second-worst batting average for a team's top three.
It's almost like Punjab Kings (PBKS) and Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) have swapped places this IPL, and now they run into each other with contrasting fortunes and form. The PBKS batting is lighting up fireworks like never before with three different batters - including Priyansh Arya, the latest IPL sensation - taking home the Player-of-the-Match awards in their three wins, and all this without Marcus Stoinis and Glenn Maxwell doing anything of note.
SRH, meanwhile, have as many worries as PBKS have things to brag about. Runs have almost vanished for all of Travis Head, Abhishek Sharma and Ishan Kishan after their first game. Even though more and more questions are being asked about their uber-aggressive batting approach, their bowlers have the worst economy rate (10.73) and the highest bowling average (41.47) in the tournament. They have the second-fewest wickets in the middle overs (7-16), and in the absence of a big-ticket spinner in their XI - having left out Adam Zampa - there is too much responsibility on the shoulders of inexperienced Zeeshan Ansari.
Be it with their batting or bowling, SRH quickly need to turn things around before the playoffs qualification gets out of their hands.
Form guide
Sunrisers Hyderabad LLLL (last four matches, most recent first)
Punjab Kings WLWW
Team news and likely XIIs
Harshal Patel had missed the last match for SRH because of an illness, and was replaced by Jaydev Unadkat, who got just two overs. If Harshal is fit again, he should slot right back in for his death bowling and cutters he bangs into the pitch. The bigger question is if they will go back to Zampa and leave out Kamindu Mendis for a better wicket-taking option.
Sunrisers Hyderabad (probable XII): 1 Travis Head, 2 Abhishek Sharma, 3 Ishan Kishan, 4 Nitish Kumar Reddy, 5 Heinrich Klaasen (wk), 6 Aniket Verma, 7 Kamindu Mendis, 8 Pat Cummins (capt), 9 Zeeshan Ansari, 10 Jaydev Unadkat/Harshal Patel, 11 Mohammed Shami, 12 Simarjeet Singh/Rahul Chahar
PBKS went unchanged into their last game, against CSK, and brought in right-arm quick Yash Thakur for the centurion Arya when it was time to bowl. They might do the same once again.
Punjab Kings (probable XII): 1 Prabhsimran Singh (wk), 2 Priyansh Arya, 3 Shreyas Iyer (capt), 4 Nehal Wadhera, 5 Shashank Singh, 6 Glenn Maxwell, 7 Marcus Stoinis, 8 Marco Jansen, 9 Yuzvendra Chahal, 10 Arshdeep Singh, 11 Lockie Ferguson, 12 Yash Thakur
Big question
SRH head coach Dan Vettori said after their last game he still wanted his top order to go aggressive, but said they must also "respect conditions". What's the best way forward for them?
In the spotlight
The Pat Cummins we have seen so far is not the same Pat Cummins we saw with the ball last year. He has been leaking runs at 11.16 an over, which is a far cry from his economy rate of 7.30 after the first five matches last season. For context, his team-mates Mohammed Shami and Harshal have gone at less than 9.50 per over so far this IPL. As compared to bowling nearly half his overs in the middle overs the last season that fetched him nine wickets while going at under eight an over, Cummins has brought himself on in the powerplay more often this time but hasn't struck more than twice and leaked 9.28 runs an over. The death overs have been the worst for him this IPL, with no wickets and an economy rate touching 19. Can he, like his batters, turn things around in this home fixture?
Yuzvendra Chahal appears like a shade of himself this season, having gone wicketless in three out of four outings so far. He has also not always been given his full quota, though. Against CSK, he came on only in the 17th over for his lone over and didn't get his fourth over against Rajasthan Royals and Gujarat Titans. If SRH's top order fires on Saturday, he will have the big task of bowling to three left-hand batters in Abhishek, Head and Kishan, and possibly Mendis later.
Stats and trivia
The average for Head and Abhishek's opening stand has fallen sharply from 49.90 last season to 16.80 this IPL.
Kishan has a delicious match-up against two PBKS bowlers. Against Arshdeep Singh, he has struck 31 runs in 15 balls while being dismissed three times. And against Chahal, he strikes at nearly 172 but has also fallen three times to him in 32 balls.
Shreyas Iyer has a strike rate of exactly 200 this IPL.
Maxwell's highest IPL score (95) was against SRH back in 2014, when he was with the same team, PBKS.
Pitch and conditions
Hyderabad has hosted three games so far, where SRH batted first on all three occasions, and their totals dipped from 286 to 190 to 152. It has been raining in the lead-up to the match, along with some thunderstorms and gusts of winds. The good news is that there is no rain forecast for Saturday evening. The temperature is expected to dip below 30 degrees Celsius after hitting 36 or so in the afternoon.
Quotes
"I don't think there are any concerns with Maxwell. We all know what a great player he is. He just finishes off the game so he's that kind of a confident player and we all believe in him, and so does our coach Ricky Ponting."
PBKS batter Nehal Wadhera backs his senior team-mate
