HIGHLIGHTS:
• On April 1, the Kolkata Knight Riders will face the Punjab Kings in the eighth match
• Shreyas Iyer is the captain of KKR
• Mayank Agarwal is the captain of PBKS
On April 1, the Kolkata Knight Riders will face the Punjab Kings in the eighth match of the IPL 2022 at Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai. In this match, KKR will be anxious to get back on track. After a strong start to the season with a six-wicket triumph against the defending champions Chennai Super Kings in the opener, the two-time champions were defeated by the Royal Challengers Bangalore by three wickets in the final over.
Punjab Kings, on the other hand, will be confident following a morale-boosting five-wicket win over RCB in their season opener last weekend. Bangalore had set a tough target of 205/2, thanks to a magnificent 88 from captain Faf du Plessis and a crucial 29-ball 41 from Virat Kohli, but the PBKS batters overcame the enormous score and claimed their first points of the season. Punjab will now aim for a second consecutive victory. Wankhede Stadium in Mumbai is the location for this match.
Report on Pitch
The Wankhede track is ideal for batting, so expect a run-fest once the hitters are settled at the crease. The teams batting first in the last two matches of this competition were unable to put up a difficult total on the board, which never proved to be enough when defending. While teams do not hesitate to bat first in afternoon games, this is not the case in evening games due to the presence of the dew factor at this site. As a result, the captain who wins the toss chooses to bowl first.
Kolkata Knight Riders
Ajinkya Rahane, Venkatesh Iyer, Nitish Rana, Shreyas Iyer (c), Sam Billings, Sheldon Jackson (wk), Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Tim Southee, Umesh Yadav, Varun Chakaravarthy
Punjab Kings
Mayank Agarwal (c), Shikhar Dhawan, Liam Livingstone, Bhanuka Rajapaksa (wk), Shahrukh Khan, Odean Smith, Raj Bawa, Arshdeep Singh, Harpreet Brar, Sandeep Sharma, Rahul Chahar
Probable Top Performers: Shikhar Dhawan
Shikhar Dhawan wore the Punjab shirt for the first time against RCB last weekend and showed a lot of potential. At a strike rate of 148.3, he scored 43 runs off 29 deliveries, including five fours and a six. In addition, the southpaw and skipper Mayank Agarwal had a 71-run opening stand. The duo will be expected to go all out against the Kolkata-based company, but all eyes will be on Dhawan this time around, as the franchise will be hoping for him to score big this time.
Umesh Yadav is the most likely best bowler of the match.
In the last two games, Umesh Yadav has been crucial with the new ball in hand. So far, the veteran fast bowler has four scalps to his name while also being extremely frugal. During KKR’s previous match against RCB, the Vidarbha pacer took the important wickets of opener Anuj Rawat and captain Virat Kohli, and tried his hardest to keep the former champions in the game while defending a low score of 128. When Kolkata meets their 2014 final opponents on April 1, Yadav will be looking for more wickets. At the same time, he’d like to make an impression before dying.
