IPL 2021: If Williamson was fit, he would have played in Bairstow's place against KKR, says SRH coach

Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) head coach Trevor Bayliss has revealed why Kane Williamson was not included in the playing XI for their opening game of the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2021 on Sunday.

Bayliss said that the team management decided to give Williamson "extra time" to regain full match fitness. SRH kickstarted their IPL 2021 campaign with a 10-run loss to Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) in Chennai. In the same interview, Bayliss has also said that if fit, Williamson would have play in the place of Jonny Bairstow against KKR.

During SRH's chase of 188, they lost their openers David Warner and Wriddhiman Saha within the first two overs. Bairstow, who played an impressive knock of 55 off 40 balls, shared a 92-run stand with Manish Pandey but the two could not help SRH cross the line successfully.

"We just felt that Kane needed a little bit of extra time to get match fit and a little bit more time in the nets. He would have played in place of Jonny Bairstow obviously if that had occurred. But we aren't too perturbed about that, Jonny has been in form recently in white-ball cricket here in India. Kane will obviously come into calculations as the tournament unfolds," Bayliss said in the post-match press conference after SRH lost to KKR on Sunday.

The New Zealand skipper had also missed his country's One-Day International (ODI) and Twenty20 International (T20I) series against Bangladesh because of the left elbow injury.

"Kane's been managing the elbow injury to varying degrees this summer and unfortunately it hasn't improved. He obviously has a high volume of training and playing across the three formats, which has inhibited his ability to recover. We believe he now needs a period of rest and rehabilitation to get the injury right. Time-frames can vary, but we're hopeful that, after an initial rest, he should be able to begin rehabilitation next week," New Zealand Cricket medical manager Dayle Shackel had earlier said in a statement.

SRH next face Royal Challengers Bangalore (RCB) at the same venue in Chennai on Wednesday (April 14). RCB are coming off a close two-wicket win over reigning champions Mumbai Indians (MI) in the opener of the IPL 2021 last week.