Kolkata, Rajasthan Royals' star stud batting will face a serious challenge to decode Sunil Narine's secret against two-time champions Kolkata Knight Riders in the IPL here on Tuesday.
Narine, who is a month shy of turning 36, was instrumental in KKR's twin victories under former captain Gautam Gambhir in 2012 and 2014.
Ever since joining the team in 2012, Narine has been sizzling at the Eden Gardens with his crafty bowling, which proved a huge threat to the opposition batsmen.
Now reunited with Gambhir, who has returned to the team as his mentor, Narine produced an all-round performance to once again revive his title hopes and a win over RR would give him pole position in the 10-team table ahead of the halfway stage. the season
His 1/19 against Sunrisers Hyderabad or his 1/17 against Lucknow Supergiants may have failed to catch the eye but those eight overs where he didn't concede a single boundary made all the difference to KKR in the end.
Phil Salt may have walked away with the player-of-the-match award in a solid eight-wicket win over LSG here on Sunday, but it was Narine who restricted LSG to a low score of 161 in the middle overs. At 7
Come Tuesday, Narine will be challenged by the likes of Sanju Samson, Ryan Parag and Shimran Hetmyer, who have scored more than 155 runs this season.
It remains to be seen if Jos Buttler is fit to include him in the playing XI after missing the last match against Punjab Kings.
With the ability to express himself at the top, with a strike-rate of 183.51 and an average of 33-plus this season, Narine has a Rashid Khan-like aura at KKR.
Mitchell Starc, who bought his IPL record, has shut down all noise to return to his elements, taking two wickets in the last over for 3/28 against LSG.
In such a scenario, the top-table contest may boil down to KKR's bowling and RR's batting.
KKR's only weak link could be their skipper Shreyas Iyer's poor form with the bat.
Even though he was unbeaten on a run-a-ball 38 in their 162-run chase against LSG, Shreyas looked tentative against pacers and spinners and KKR's batting could well be exposed if RR manage to make an early breakthrough.
KKR's batting has largely depended on Salt-Narain's fireworks this season and Andre Russell's blitz at the death has left the Indian batsmen untested.
Rinku Singh has had a quiet season with 63 runs from four innings and hasn't been given much of a chance, while vice-captain Nitish Rana is out with an injury.
RR have a formidable bowling line-up in Trent Boult, Avesh Khan, Yuzvendra Chahal and Keshav Maharaj, but it remains to be seen if Ravichandran Ashwin is fit for the match.
Teams:
Kolkata Knight Riders: Shreyas Iyer, KS Bharath, Rahmanullah Gurbaj, Rinku Singh, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Sherfane Rutherford, Manish Pandey, Andre Russell, Nitish Rana, Venkatesh Iyer, Anukul Roy, Ramandeep Singh, Varun Chakraborty, Varun Chakraborty Dear Zakaria, Harshit Rana, Suyash Sharma, Mitchell Starc, Dushmantha Chamera, Saqib Hussain and Mujeeb ur Rahman.
Rajasthan Royals: Sanju Samson, Jos Buttler, Shimron Hetmyer, Yassavi Jaiswal, Dhruv Jurel, Ryan Parag, Donovan Ferreira, Kunal Rathore, Ravichandran Ashwin, Kuldeep Sen, Navdeep Saini, Sandeep Sharma, Trent Boult, Yuzvendra Khan, Aveshwell, Rowe Aveshwell, , Shubham Dubey, Tom Kohler-Cadmore, Abid Mushtaq, Nandre Berger, Tanush Kotyan, Keshav Maharaj.
Match Start: 7:30 PM.
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