NEW DELHI: Lucknow Super Giants captain Rishabh Pant won the toss and chose to bowl first in their IPL clash against Kolkata Knight Riders at Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Thursday. KKR are still on the hunt for their opening victory of the campaign, while LSG will be looking to make the early advantage count in front of their opponents.
KKR received a notable boost with Sunil Narine returning to the playing group after missing the previous match against PBKS. Pant, speaking after the toss, said, “We’re aiming to bowl first. Our plan is to put the opposition under pressure by asking them to bat. We back our bowlers to execute the role. A win would definitely lift the team’s energy and atmosphere. We’re sticking with the same side, and we feel the top order is more batting-heavy, but we’re confident it will see us through.”
KKR captain Ajinkya Rahane, meanwhile, explained his decision to field, adding, “We wanted to bowl. (About his batting call in the last match) That game didn’t finish, so anything can happen. Sunil is back in the XI, and Varun is still dealing with a hand injury. When Cam Green bowls, it gives us an extra bowling option.”
Teams
Kolkata Knight Riders (Playing XI)
- Ajinkya Rahane (c)
- Finn Allen
- Cameron Green
- Angkrish Raghuvanshi (w)
- Rinku Singh
- Rovman Powell
- Ramandeep Singh
- Anukul Roy
- Sunil Narine
- Navdeep Saini
- Kartik Tyagi
Kolkata Knight Riders Impact subs
- Manish Pandey
- Vaibhav Arora
- Tejasvi Dahiya
- Rahul Tripathi
- Tim Seifert
Lucknow Super Giants (Playing XI)
- Mitchell Marsh
- Aiden Markram
- Rishabh Pant (w/c)
- Nicholas Pooran
- Abdul Samad
- Mukul Choudhary
- Manimaran Siddharth
- Avesh Khan
- Mohammed Shami
- Digvesh Singh Rathi
- Prince Yadav
Lucknow Super Giants Impact subs
- Ayush Badoni
- Matthew Breetzke
- Shahbaz Ahmad
- Mayank Yadav
- Himmat Singh
