IPL 2025: Matthew Hayden feels SRH started to doubt their aggressive batting approach

Sunrisers Hyderabad were easily one of the most hyped sides when it came to their batting firepower coming into the Indian Premier League's 2025 edition, especially after what their openers - Abhishek Sharma and Travis Head did last year. This year, however, apart from a few games here and there, SRH have been well short of their best with the bat. They have won only three of their nine games so far, and are an inch away from being out of the Playoffs' race.

Former Australian cricketer, Matthew Hayden, felt that SRH's mini-vacation to Maldives post their game against Chennai Super Kings would help them rejuvenate their state of mind. He also observed that there could very well be a possibility in relation to them not feeling that their ultra-aggressive approach was not feasible.

"There's something healing about going to the Maldives. Yeah, well, they've had a bit of a break and breather, and that can maybe just reset, recalibrate, refocus, because they were the side we were thinking, gosh, these guys are going to be extraordinary with the bat. Haven't done that, have they? Haven't quite been on the mark. I get a feeling that they actually start to doubt the way that they go about it. They started to think, that 280 is not sustainable. And maybe that little recalibration drifting away aimlessly in the Indian Ocean, and put them back on centre again," Hayden shared via JioHotstar.

Haven't done it as consistently as last year: Gavaskar

Ex-Indian skipper, Sunil Gavaskar, was also part of the same discussion. Despite admitting that the pair of Travis Head and Abhishek Sharma did not really click like they did in 2024, he felt that the two could really turn things around for their franchise if they fire with the bat in the remainder of the games.

"They were the most attractive team last year because everybody wanted to see how Travis Head and Abhishek were thrashing the bowling about. They've done it a couple of times, but they haven't done it as consistently as last year, and that's why they are struggling to get off the board in the knockouts. But who knows, in the next 3 games, they win all their matches, they get off to the kind of start that they've got from Head and Abhishek and they could post 200+ scores and any time a team posts 200+ scores, that's difficult to chase," noted Gavaskar.

Ahead of their game against Gujarat Titans, the defending champions are positioned ninth in the table. They would be required to win all of their remaining matches from this point to have a shot at securing a berth in the playoffs of IPL 2025.