When Kolkata Knight Riders take on Chennai Super Kings in their next IPL 2020 league contest at Abu Dhabi, two Caribbean stars will be the hot features for their sides. While Andre Russell will be champing at the bits to put his strength and power-hitting to right use for KKR, Dwayne Bravo, back from injury, will be keen to re-discover his value for CSK. With both men being all-rounders in the truest form of the word, expert in all three cricketing arts, this will be one face-off worth waiting for. While Russell has often been
unstoppable in the KKR line-up, Bravo has done immense amounts of work for CSK over the years.
Russell has been an integral part of the KKR scheme of things for a while now and IPL 2020 has seen him in action in all the franchise's matches. He has played four matches and scored 48 runs, 24 of them coming in one inning, and he has a strike rate of 145.45.
This is a far cry from his IPL career strike-rate of 184.69, carved over 68 matches for 1448 runs. That is what he will be gunning for.
Then there is the wickets column. Russell has claimed four wickets in IPL 2020 at an economy of 7.75, something his teammates could take some lessons from. Overall, he has 59 wickets at an economy of 8.83.
Bravo has played two matches in IPL 2020 and is yet to bat. He is also wicket-less so far, but that could change.
Overall, Bravo has played 136 IPL matches for 1483 runs at a strike rate of 128.28.
What he loses out in strike-rate to Russell, Bravo more than amply makes up in terms of wickets. With 147 wickets at 8.38, Bravo is far ahead of Russell.
These two can be fascinating to watch. People have often seen the duels between Bravo and Kieron Pollard and this one is right up there in terms of bravado. The stage is set.
Note: All stats courtesy iplt20.com