A rivalry made popular only on the basis of iconic and enthralling encounters, a new chapter awaits in Chinnaswamy on the 29th as Royal Challengers Bengaluru take on the Kolkata Knight Riders.
Team Preview
Royal Challengers Bengaluru
Heading into the season with a monumental WPL trophy, Faf and co. got off to a disappointing start, losing the season opener to CSK. Wicketkeeper batsmen Karthik and Anuj Rawat were the upsides from the first innings whereas with the ball Siraj’s failure was early signs of worry given the rest of RCB’s bowling line-up’s lack of success in IPL.
Chinnaswamy proved to be the ironic venue of comeback, where a Siraj led-RCB bowling attack kept PBKS down to a par score and a Kohli masterclass backed by finishers clutching meant RCB are now of the mark and sit at the 6th position.
Kolkata Knight Riders
A season of homecomings, Gautam gave a sudden rush of reminiscence to all KKR fans, sending Narine to open.
Half an hour after that, KKR fans probably had a PTSD attack, watching the team 32/3, a characteristic score given their top-order struggles over the past couple of years. And as always the middle-order made a comeback, led by the evergreen Dre Russ’s 64(25)*. All things seemed to be under control prior to Klaasen-storm smashing 47 runs in the 18th and 19th over. But Harshit Rana’s ice-cold final over meant KKR walked away with the 2 points and now sits at no. 4.
Probable Playing XI
Royal Challengers Bengaluru (Batting First): Virat Kohli, Faf Du Plessis (c), Cameron Green, Rajat Patidar, Glenn Maxwell, Anuj Rawat, Dinesh Karthik (wk), Mahipal Lomror, Mayank Dagar, Mohammad Siraj, Alzarri Joseph
Impact Player: Yash Dayal in place of Rajat Patidar.
Coming off a win, RCB management has very few reasons to make a change to their winning formula.
Though Alzarri’s spot might be at risk. Yet to justify his 11.5CR price tag, Joseph has conceded runs in excess of 10 rpo in both of the matches so far. With Topley and Ferguson sitting in the dugout, Joseph might lose out on his place, most probably to Ferguson given he is the superior death bowler compared to Topley and was in good touch against Australia-series preceding the IPL. Though we back RCB to back Alzarri.
The other one might be of RCB playing an extra bowler in place of Lomror though given Lomror’s important role in the previous match, it’s highly unlikely this happens.
Kolkata Knight Riders (Batting First): Phil Salt, Sunil Narine, Venkatesh Iyer, Shreyas Iyer, Nitish Rana, Ramandeep Singh, Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Mitchell Starc, Varun Chakravarty, Harshit Rana
Impact Player: Suyash Sharma
KKR too are expected to back their winning formula. They might be tempted to play an extra pacer such as Sakariya/Vaibhav Arora in place of Suyash given the match is taking place in Eden but Suyash was successful in the very stadium last year, and anyhow they have an extra pacer in the form of Russell. Thus expect the spin trio to ramble on.
Pitch Report
Chinnaswamy has always been a batting paradise in the IPL. Last season, the ground saw an average first innings score of 196. However, the previous match seemed to have something for the bowlers. Top-order batters barring Kohli and to some extent, Prabsimran struggled to get going, with the pitch being two-faced as one of the potential reasons. Nevertheless, one can’t change the dimensions and expect big hitters such as Maxwell and Russell to make full use of the 60m side boundaries.
Players To Watch Out For
Virat Kohli
The only man with 7K IPL runs, Kohli was back in business in the previous match, after a short break from the game. With wicket tumbling all around Kohli stood tall against the Punjab bowlers all while maintaining his scoring rate. He has issues in pacing the innings while batting first but he becomes another monster when it comes to chasing. He doesn’t have a good matchup against Sunil Narine though if there was one night where he could change it all, it would be on the 29th.
Andre Russell
After a disappointing 2023, rumours were floating around of Russell possibly not being retained ahead of the 2024 season. Well, those proved to be baseless but the question remained of whether Russell could replay the glory days. Well on the 23rd we got the answer and it was a resounding yes! First smacking 62 of just 24 balls, Dre Russ returned to pick up 2 crucial wickets in the 2nd innings. He has had terrific performances in 2024 across leagues such as the ILT20 and BPL, and KKR would hope their perennial knight maintains his fantastic record against RCB.
RCB vs KKR Dream11 Team for Match 10 of 2023 IPL
Note: This is not our final Dream11 Team as we are not aware of the Toss Result/Final Playing XI of both teams at this moment.
To remain updated and get our final Dream11 Team, Join our Telegram channel Clan For Gamers
