Virat Kohli’s resurgent Royal Challengers Bangalore and Dinesh Karthik’s Kolkata Knight Riders will lock horns with each other on Monday in the Indian Premier League (IPL) 2020 at Sharjah Cricket Stadium. The Kolkata Knight Riders is standing a place above the RCB due to better net run rate but the inconsistency in batting has been an issue for both the teams. While the bowlers from both sides performed well on the field in a last few matches.
KKR are on third place in the IPL 2020 poinstable after registering two back-to-back wins against Chennai Super Kings and Kings XI Punjab. KKR will look to complete their hat-trick win against RCB. On the other hand, the biggest positive for RCB is that captain Kohli has finally got his form back. Kohli scored a match-winning 90 run in the last match against CSK when other RCB batsmen failed to score runs on the board.
RCBs left-handed opener Devdutt Padikkal has been in good touch but AB de Villiers has looked out of their form in recent innings. The big-hitting Aaron Finch is also struggling to provide a good start to their team.
Meanwhile for KKR, the biggest cause of concern will be the availability of big-hitter Andre Russell, who hurt his knee when he dived into the advertisement boards after missing a catch on Saturday. Skipper Dinesh Karthik did not reveal the extent of the injury after the match against King XI Punjab.
KKR have witnessed batting inconsistency this year. Shubman Gill has been fabulous at the top with two half-centuries so far. Nitish Rana has looked good while Eoin Morgan has also been erratic. Skipper Karthik, who were facing a lot of criticism for his batting, was back among runs with a vital 29-ball 58 against KXIP.
The two sides have played 24 IPL matches against each other, KKR win 14 of them and RCB sealing victories in 10 games. Both teams have won their four matches out of six.
Squads:
Kolkata Knight Riders: Rahul Tripathi, Shubman Gill, Nitish Rana, Eoin Morgan, Dinesh Karthik(w/c), Andre Russell, Pat Cummins, Sunil Narine, Kamlesh Nagarkoti, Prasidh Krishna, Varun Chakravarthy, Kuldeep Yadav, Sandeep Warrier, Siddhesh Lad, Nikhil Naik, Chris Green, Lockie Ferguson, Rinku Singh, Ali Khan, Tom Banton, Shivam Mavi and Manimaran Siddharth
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Royal Challengers Bangalore: Virat Kohli (c), AB de Villiers (wk), Devdutt Padikkal, Aaron Finch, Moeen Ali, Shivam Dube, Washington Sundar, Isuru Udana, Navdeep Saini, Mohammed Siraj, Yuzvendra Chahal, Umesh Yadav, Dale Steyn, Parthiv Patel, Pawan Negi, Chris Morris, Pavan Deshpande, Josh Philippe, Shahbaz Ahmed, Adam Zampa and Gurkeerat Singh Mann.
Match details
Time: 07: 30 PM IST
Venue: Sharjah Cricket Stadium