Gautam Gambhir is leading DD in IPL 2018. (Source: BCCI)
Gautam Gambhir will be making his much-awaited return to the Eden Gardens as he leads the Delhi Daredevils against Kolkata Knight Riders on Monday. After beating Mumbai at their home ground, Gambhir will be hoping that DD can continue to maintain the momentum. On the other hand, after facing successive defeats Dinesh Karthik will be facing a stern test as he looks to get his side’s campaign back on track. KKR began the tournament on a good note by securing a win against RCB but from thereon lost their way. While injuries are continuing to deplete the KKR outfit what has also gone against them is the patchy form displayed by the batsmen and the seamers. The spinners have been the shining light for the purple brigade this season and Karthik will be hoping that they continue to deliver if he has to control the attacking batting unit of DD. Led by Jason Roy, DD showed their might after chasing down 195 against a potent bowling attack of MI. Hence, the contest between the tweakers and DD’s batsman will be one to watch out for.
Weaknesses: KKR’s batting seems over-reliant on big hitters Chris Lynn and Andre Russell. Against CSK, KKR put up 202 on the board but majority of runs were scored by Russell. In the last match against SRH, when Russell failed, the total could not even cross 140. Hence, the other batsmen need to pull up their socks and fire in unison. DD’s bowling attack also needs to check the flow of runs after leaking runs consistently in all their three matches so far.
Players to watch out for: Both the teams boast of some of the biggest hitters of the game. While on one hand will be the likes of Chris Lynn, Sunil Narine and Andre Russell. On the other side will be Jason Roy, Gautam Gambhir, Rishabh Pant, Glenn Maxwell and Shreyas Iyer. Hence this clash also promises to be a mouth-watering contest.
SQUADS:
Kolkata Knight Riders: Chris Lynn, Sunil Narine, Robin Uthappa, Nitish Rana, Dinesh Karthik(w/c), Andre Russell, Shubman Gill, Shivam Mavi, Mitchell Johnson, Piyush Chawla, Kuldeep Yadav, Vinay Kumar, Tom Curran, Ishank Jaggi, Prasidh Krishna, Apoorv Wankhade, Rinku Singh, Cameron Delport, Javon Searles
Delhi Daredevils: Jason Roy, Gautam Gambhir(c), Rishabh Pant(w), Glenn Maxwell, Shreyas Iyer, Vijay Shankar, Daniel Christian, Rahul Tewatia, Shahbaz Nadeem, Mohammed Shami, Trent Boult, Chris Morris, Colin Munro, Amit Mishra, Prithvi Shaw, Harshal Patel, Avesh Khan, Jayant Yadav, Gurkeerat Singh Mann, Manjot Kalra, Abhishek Sharma, Sandeep Lamichhane, Naman Ojha, Sayan Ghosh, Liam Plunkett