New Delhi, May 7 (IANS) Donovan Ferreira and Gulbadin Naib were handed their tournament debuts as Rajasthan Royals captain Sanju Samson won the toss and elected to bowl first against Delhi Capitals in Match 56 of Indian Premier League (IPL) 2024 at the Arun Jaitley Stadium on Tuesday evening.

All three matches played in New Delhi in IPL 2024 have been won by teams batting first. Both teams come into the match after suffering defeats in their last game – DC lost to Kolkata Knight Riders by seven wickets at Eden Gardens last week. RR, on the other hand, suffered a solitary run defeat to Sunrisers Hyderabad in a thrilling match at the Rajiv Gandhi International Stadium.

In place of Dhruv Jurel and Shimron Hetmyer, who miss out on Tuesday’s match due to their respective niggles, RR have included lower-order batter Shubham Dubey and South Africa all-rounder Ferreira, who can also keep wickets if needed.

“Looks a good wicket to chase on. We are comfortable doing both (batting first and chasing later). The environment in the team is what pleases me, we have great characters, and of course winning helps,” said Samson.

Tuesday’s game is a must-win for DC, currently in sixth place with 12 points from 11 games with an inferior NRR, to stay in contention for the playoffs. If they are to get to 16 points, they need to win their remaining three games, starting from Tuesday’s home game against RR.

DC skipper Rishabh Pant said veteran fast-bowler Ishant Sharma and Afghanistan’s pace-bowling all-rounder Naib come into the playing eleven. Naib was drafted in by DC as a late replacement for the injured Mitchell Marsh.

“Pitches this season are more batting-friendly. Some injuries, health issues are there in our team, but we don't want focus on those things, and we got to focus on the matches and do our best,” said Pant.

Tuesday’s game will be played on the pitch which was used for the DC-SRH game on April 20, where the visitors’ won by 67 runs after posting 266 on batting first. The last time these two teams met in IPL 2024, RR edged DC by 12 runs at the Sawai Mansingh Stadium in Jaipur, with Riyan Parag making an unbeaten 45-ball 84.

Playing XIs:

Delhi Capitals: Yashasvi Jaiswal, Sanju Samson (c/wk), Riyan Parag, Donovan Ferreira, Rovman Powell, Shubham Dubey, Ravichandran Ashwin, Trent Boult, Avesh Khan, Sandeep Sharma and Yuzvendra Chahal

Substitutes: Jos Buttler, Kuldeep Sen, Tom Kohler-Cadmore, Tanush Kotian and Kunal Singh Rathore

Rajasthan Royals: Jake Fraser-McGurk, Abishek Porel, Shai Hope, Rishabh Pant (c/wk), Tristan Stubbs, Gulbadin Naib, Axar Patel, Kuldeep Yadav, Mukesh Kumar, Ishant Sharma and Khaleel Ahmed

Substitutes: Rasikh Salam Dar, Praveen Dubey, Lalit Yadav, Sumit Kumar and Kumar Kushagra