Revealed: Why is Matheesha Pathirana not playing today's match against SRH and who has replaced him?

Chennai Super Kings will be looking to get back to winning ways when they take on Sunrisers Hyderabad in the 18th game of the ongoing Indian Premier League 2024 (IPL 2024).

The defending champions began their title defense on a winning note. In the tournament opener, they thrashed Royal Challengers Bengaluru by 63 runs. In their next game, they registered another victory as they thrashed last year's runners-up Gujarat Titans by 63 runs.

However, their winning start ended earlier this week against Delhi Capitals in Vishakhapatnam. The Rishabh Pant-led side won the game by 20 runs to get off the mark in IPL and end CSK's winning start to the season. The five-time IPL champions have a reputation of bouncing back quickly and they will be looking to return to winning ways by beating SRH.

Matheesha Pathirana is not available:

However, CSK will be without their key bowler Matheesha Pathirana for the game against SRH at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium in Hyderabad. At a venue where more than 500 runs were scored in the last game, CSK has suffered a big blow with the absence of Matheesha Pathirana.

Captain Ruturaj Gaikwad confirmed the news at the toss, saying that the Sri Lanka star has missed out due to a niggle. With the pacer out, CSK have made three changes to their playing eleven.

"It's going pretty well, the group is responding well. Nothing much changes for me, obviously this is a new challenge, but I'm feeling good. Pathirana has a niggle - three changes for us, Moeen Ali,Theekshana and Mukesh Chowdhary come in. The bowlers are ready to go and so are the youngsters," said Gaikwad.

Pathirana was CSK's pick of the bowlers in their last game against DC. While other bowlers failed to impress, he picked up three wickets for 31 runs. CSK will be hoping that the injury is not serious and the pacer returns to action soon.

CSK Playing XI:

Ruturaj Gaikwad(c), Rachin Ravindra, Ajinkya Rahane, Moeen Ali, Daryl Mitchell, Shivam Dube, Ravindra Jadeja, MS Dhoni(w), Deepak Chahar, Tushar Deshpande, Maheesh Theekshana