Punjab made one change, bringing in seam-bowling allrounder Chris Jordan for spin-bowling allrounder Fabian Allen
Kolkata Knight Riders chose to bowl vs Punjab Kings
Eoin Morgan, the Kolkata Knight Riders captain, won the toss and chose to bowl in what is the first game in Ahmedabad of IPL 2021.
With four defeats in their last five games, the Knight Riders are currently placed at the bottom of the points table but they decided to go with an unchanged XI. “We have the opportunity to turn it around,” Morgan said. “A little bit of momentum and confidence can make the difference.”
The Knight Riders have been grappling with powerplay issues in the last couple of games. Against the Chennai Super Kings, they were 45 for 5 after the first six overs. In their next game against the Rajasthan Royals, they went ultra-defensive and managed only 25 for 1 in that phase.
The Punjab Kings, on the other hand, must be riding on the confidence of a nine-wicket win against the Mumbai Indians in their last game. They made one change, though, bringing in seam-bowling allrounder Chris Jordan in place of spin-bowling allrounder Fabian Allen. One reason behind that could be the pitches in Ahmedabad were more conducive to seamers than spinners in the recent India-England T20I series.
That means Ravi Bishnoi is the only frontline spinner in the Kings XI. But in the last couple of games, Deepak Hooda has shown he can also chip in with a few overs of spin if required.
Punjab Kings: 1 KL Rahul (capt & wk), 2 Mayank Agarwal, 3 Chris Gayle, 4 Nicholas Pooran, 5 Deepak Hooda, 6 Shahrukh Khan, 7 Moises Henriques, 8 Chris Jordan, 9 Ravi Bishnoi, 10 Mohammed Shami, 11 Arshdeep Singh
Kolkata Knight Riders: 1 Nitish Rana, 2 Shubman Gill, 3 Rahul Tripathi, 4 Eoin Morgan (capt), 5 Andre Russell, 6 Dinesh Karthik (wk), 7 Sunil Narine, 8 Pat Cummins, 9 Shivam Mavi, 10 Prasidh Krishna, 11 Varun Chakravarthy
Hemant Brar is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo