Big hitters, quality bowlers go head to head when MI Cape Town host Sunrisers

Having come unstuck at the Wanderers against the Joburg Super Kings on Sunday, the Sunrisers Eastern Cape now face more tricky opponents, in MI Cape Town, at Newlands, on Wednesday.

The two-time defending champions, the Sunrisers, were properly crushed by JSK on Sunday and brought back down to Earth after winning four games in a row up to that match. This, after they had lost their first three games.

After scoring just 118 batting first, JSK raced to the target in 14 overs with Devon Conway and Wihan Lubbe scoring the bulk of the runs.

Sunrisers batting

It was, however, the poor top order batting by the Sunrisers, mixed with good bowling by JSK’s Lutho Sipamla and Hardus Viljoen that undid the men from Gqeberha.

Shaky starts have been the order of the day for the Sunrisers this season and they’ll hope to finally fire at the top of the order in Cape Town, when they’ll again face some quality bowling from the home team.

Kagiso Rabada, Rashid Khan, George Linde, and Trent Boult have all proved to be a handful so the Sunrisers batters will hope to find the form they had when they managed to put four wins in a row together midway through the tournament.

Chasing second place

Both teams, the Sunrisers and MI Cape Town, are chasing second place on the log behind Paarl Royals, with just a handful of games remaining before the playoffs next week.

Of course, up to now, it has mainly been the Sunrisers’ bowlers who’ve led their team’s charge, with Marco Jansen, Richard Gleeson, Liam Dawson and Ottneil Baartman brilliant in most matches, so their matchup with Cape Town’s batters will be one of the big highlights.

MI Cape Town boast the likes of Ryan Rickelton, Rassie van der Dussen, Reeza Hendricks and Dewald Brevis in their lineup so an intriguing battle between bat and ball is in store for the fans.

This is the return match of the opening game of the 2025 season when MI Cape Town posted 174/7 in Gqeberha on 9 January and then bowled out their hosts and defending champions for 77 in 15 overs. A lot has happened since then, but what will the outcome be this time, at what is likely to be a packed Newlands?