Kolkata Knight Riders will be taking on Punjab Kings in their next IPL 2023 match on Monday at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata. KKR are currently standing at the eighth spot on the points table with a total of four wins out of ten matches. They will be coming to this after registering a five-run victory over Sunrisers Hyderabad in a last-ball thriller. Pacers Vaibhav Arora and Harshit Rana had a good outing against SRH and are likely to retain their places for the next match.
A 'Go To' man in Kolkata Knight Riders for more than a decade, Sunil Narine will have to play out of his skin to justify his place in the playing eleven when his team face PBKS.
The Trinidad man, who has played 158 games spread across 12 seasons, including the current one, has 159 wickets along with 1039 runs with four half-centuries after he worked on his batting once his action was deemed suspect and he lost fizz of the pitch.
KKR staring at another round robin exit with only four wins in 10 games, there is no room for error in next four games.
That Varun Chakravarthy has become their premier spinner -- 14 wickets at 20.14 -- makes it a stronger case that KKR must think beyond Narine, if not Andre Russell.
A leg-spinner, who bowls at 90-95kph, Chakravarthy has spearheaded the spin attack brilliantly.
He showed the way when Nitish Rana gave him the task to defend nine runs in the last over as KKR snatched a thrilling five-run win against SRH.
KKR's Predicted XI against PBKS: Rahmanullah Gurbaz (wk), Jason Roy, Venkatesh Iyer, Nitish Rana (c), Andre Russell, Rinku Singh, Sunil Narine, Shardul Thakur, Vaibhav Arora, Harshit Rana, Varun Chakaravarthy.
(With PTI Inputs)