Royal Challengers Bangalore will look to put their disastrous 2017 campaign behind them when they travel to Kolkata to play the Knight Riders in their tournament opener on Sunday (18:30).
Virat Kohli has taken regular breaks over the past few months to keep himself operating at optimum level and the Bangalore captain said he has almost reached that level at the start of this edition of the IPL.
The Knight Riders are making a fresh start under the leadership of Dinesh Karthik after severing ties with the long serving Gautam Gambhir.
TALKING POINTS
Kolkata are without fast bowler Mitchell Starc but have decent cover in the pace bowling department. England’s Tom Curran, West Indies’ Andre Russell and even India Under-19 World Cup heroes Kamlesh Nagarkoti and Shivami Mavi are capable of carrying the workload. On the batting front, the form and fitness of destructive opening batsman Chris Lynn will determine how far Kolkata go in the tournament.
Bangalore have the luxury of Kohli and AB de Villiers in the form of their lives. There is every chance of repeating the feats of 2016 where Kohli made 973 runs and AB 687. However, pace bowling is not their strongest suit. The Royal Challengers will rely on the wily spin of Yuzvendra Chahal and Washington Sundar.
PLAYERS IN FOCUS
The Knight Riders picked the cream of India’s Under-19 World Cup winning team. Top order batsman Shubman Gill and fast bowlers Nagarkoti and Mavi will be raring to have a go at a stage bigger and more challenging than the U19 World Cup. It is unlikely Kolkata will go in with all three right at the start of the tournament but expect two to be part of the mix. The fast bowlers especially will be under scrutiny as one will know whether they have it in them to stand up to the big boys.
LIKELY LINE-UPS
Kolkata Knight Riders: Chris Lynn, Shubman Gill, Robin Uthappa, Dinesh Karthik (c), Nitish Rana, Andre Russell, Tom Curran, Kuldeep Yadav, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Piyush Chawla, Sunil Narine
Royal Challengers Bangalore: Quinton de Kock, Parthiv Patel, Virat Kohli (c), AB de Villiers, Sarfaraz Khan, Colin de Grandhomme, Washington Sundar, Tim Southee, Navdeep Saini, Umesh Yadav, Yuzvendra Chahal
