The two bottom-placed teams – Chennai Super Kings and Kolkata Knight Riders – will look to rise up the ladder when they take on each other at the MA Chidambaram Stadium, Chennai on Tuesday. While CSK were able to bag their first win of the season in the previous game against Delhi Capitals, Kolkata Knight Riders are still on the hunt for their maiden victory.
KKR had the last match against Lucknow Super Giants in their grasp, but it was snatched by Mukul Choudhary as the 21-year-old youngster from Jhunjhunu scored a match-winning knock of 54 runs off just 27 balls.
KKR’s issues have been palpable with both bat and ball and they need to click as a unit sooner rather than later. Their death bowling remains a huge concern and they will need to pull up their socks.
Ajinkya Rahane was left scratching his head when Choudhary got going at the fag end of the innings. Matheesha Pathirana is expected to join the team soon, and the team would hope that he could hit the ground running.
On the other hand, Ruturaj Gaikwad’s form is concerning for CSK. Sanju Samson and Ayush Mhatre scored fine knocks of 115 and 59 runs respectively against DC, and they would aim to keep up the good show.
Head to Head: Matches: 32, Won by CSK: 20, Won by KKR: 11, No result: 1.
Kolkata Knight Riders Squad: Ajinkya Rahane(c), Finn Allen, Angkrish Raghuvanshi(w), Cameron Green, Rinku Singh, Rovman Powell, Ramandeep Singh, Anukul Roy, Sunil Narine, Navdeep Saini, Kartik Tyagi, Manish Pandey, Vaibhav Arora, Tejasvi Dahiya, Rahul Tripathi, Tim Seifert, Blessing Muzarabani, Saurabh Dubey, Sarthak Ranjan, Rachin Ravindra, Prashant Solanki, Varun Chakaravarthy, Matheesha Pathirana, Umran Malik, Daksh Kamra
Chennai Super Kings Squad: Sanju Samson(w), Ruturaj Gaikwad(c), Ayush Mhatre, Sarfaraz Khan, Shivam Dube, Dewald Brevis, Jamie Overton, Noor Ahmad, Anshul Kamboj, Gurjapneet Singh, Khaleel Ahmed, Matthew Short, Akeal Hosein, Kartik Sharma, Prashant Veer, Matt Henry, Ramakrishna Ghosh, MS Dhoni, Shreyas Gopal, Rahul Chahar, Spencer Johnson, Mukesh Choudhary, Urvil Patel, Aman Khan, Zakary Foulkes
