Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) head coach Daniel Vettori didn't shy away from heaping praise on left-arm spinner R Sai Kishore while admitting that the 2016 champions wanted him to be part of their side but couldn't. As his side registered its third win of the ongoing season of the IPL against the Chennai Super Kings, Vettori was asked in the post-match press conference as to the left-arm spinners who have impressed him the most and the former New Zealand captain put all his money on Sai Kishore.
"I'm trying to think... [Mitchell] Santner's obviously been fantastic for Mumbai, Jaddu [Ravindra Jadeja] here, Harpreet Brar has got a few opportunities with Punjab... remind me who the rest are who's been playing? Sai Kishore's been the pick [of the bowlers]. He has been fantastic, I think," Vettori said after SRH's five-wicket win against CSK.
"He was a guy that we looked at very closely in the auction and wanted him in the team. He has all the attributes of a very good limited-overs bowler.
"He's very brave, he has the ability to turn the ball, changes his pace, over and around the wicket and I think, sort of sets up the template for other spinners to see how you can actually compete and succeed and he has done it on good batting wickets," Vettori added.
SRH were hoping to get him at the base price or somewhere close to it before pulling out very early. Punjab Kings had Kishore at Rs 90 Lakh and increased the bid up to Rs 2 crore after Gujarat Titans expressed their interest to get him back. However, the current table-toppers used their right-to-match card at Rs 2 crore to have Kishore back in the setup and have used him regularly in this season and the lanky spinner has delivered, having taken 12 wickets at the second-best average among the top 10 bowlers of the season, at 16.3.
Sunrisers don't really have a left-arm spinner in their squad this season; however, utilised the ambidextrousness of Kamindu Mendis, who could switch between bowling right-arm off-spin and left-arm orthodox in the same over and yet deliver the goods with the required control. Vettori admitted that he didn't appreciate his bowling enough and the ability to bowl with both hands but Mendis' inclusion primarily for his batting helped SRH extract results from him in all three departments.
SRH have to win all three matches in the remainder of the tournament and will hope to take a leaf out of RCB's book from last year, where they sort of set a playbook of how to go about it when you need to win potentially everything to stay alive in the race to the playoffs with 5-6 matches remaining.