IPL 2024, KKR vs SRH: Iyer's comeback, Starc vs Cummins headlines at Eden Gardens

There will be several subplots when Kolkata Knight Riders (KKR) host Sunrisers Hyderabad (SRH) at the Eden Gardens in Kolkata on Saturday. First up, all eyes will be on KKR skipper Shreyas Iyer as he makes a comeback from a long injury layoff. Then there is the Pat Cummins vs Mitchell Starc rivalry to look forward to, with the former leading the Hyderabad outfit this season. Simply put, this match promises to be a cracker of a contest.

Back injury had ruled out Shreyas Iyer of the entire IPL 2023 but the 29-year-old returns to lead the side this time around. However, a year later, injuries refuse to let go of Shreyas Iyer. Iyer’s back injury resurfaced during the Ranji Trophy final between Mumbai and Vidarbha, where he scored 95. While it remains to be seen if Iyer will be available for all games, he isn’t thinking too much about the injury. “I don’t want to think about what the doctor has said, what the injury was because, as I mentioned previously, when you over-think, put your focus on the injury, and in that moment, forget about what you’re doing the best,” Iyer told reporters ahead of the match.

KKR’s most successful leader Gautam Gambhir is back in his second innings as a mentor. His partnership with head coach Chandrakant Pandit, a shrewd tactician in domestic circuit, will be the key to their revival.

“This is your franchise, make it or break it,” team principal owner Shah Rukh Khan has told Gambhir. Under the former India cricketer’s captaincy, KKR had a golden run from 2011-2017 – two IPL titles, five playoffs and a runners-up finish in the now defunct Champions League T20 tournament.

The biggest signing of this IPL is with KKR, and by acquiring Starc at a record sum of Rs 24.75-crore, the left-arm quick will be under huge pressure to perform.

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His spell in power-play and the death overs will be the key. Starc and Andre Russell are the only two experienced pacers in KKR’s ranks, and with no like-for-like replacements for them, their workload management will be crucial.

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KKR boast of a star-studded top-order batting lineup in Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Phil Salt, Venkatesh Iyer and Shreyas to go with the Russell-Rinku Singh firepower at the death.

But the Gambhir-mentored side will rely heavily on the home conditions to offer some spin so as to give the likes of Sunil Narine, Varun Chakravarthy and Suyash Sharma some assistance.

Starc will have his skipper Cummins leading SRH in the adjacent dug-out as the Australian captain will also have his task cut out. Cummins (Rs 20.50-crore) is the second-most expensive buy in this IPL and all eyes will be on him to revive the fortunes of the side that has had two wooden-spoon finishes in the last three seasons.

On paper, KKR with a star-studded batting and spin-heavy attack to complement Starc’s pace, will be overwhelming favourites.

But SRH, under the shrewd captaincy of Cummins, will definitely fancy their chances. Travis Head and Heinrich Klaasen’s batting firepower in the power-play and death overs will be vital. Their bowling also looks balanced with the experienced Cummins and India’s veteran death-overs specialist Bhuvneshwar Kumar in the lineup, while the likes of Washington Sundar and Wanindu Hasaranga will be crucial in the spin department.

It remains to be seen whether Hasaranga, the ace Sri Lankan allrounder who has been banned by the ICC for the Tests against Bangladesh, will be available for SRH’s opener.

Squads:

Kolkata Knight Riders: Shreyas Iyer (c), Nitish Rana (vc), Manish Pandey, Ramandeep Singh, Rinku Singh, Sakib Hussain, Anukul Roy, Venkatesh Iyer, Sherfane Rutherford, Angkrish, Raghuvanshi, Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, KS Bharat, Phil Salt, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Vaibhav Arora, Chetan Sakariya, Dushmantha Chameera, Varun Chakaravarthy, Mitchell Starc, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Harshit Rana and Suyash Sharma.

Sunrisers Hyderabad: Pat Cummins (c), Abdul Samad, Abhishek Sharma, Aiden Markram, Travis Head, Wanindu Hasaranga, Marco Jansen, Rahul Tripathi, Washington Sundar, Glenn Phillips, Sanvir Singh, Heinrich Klaasen, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Mayank Agarwal, T. Natarajan, Anmolpreet Singh, Mayank Markande, Upendra Singh Yadav, Umran Malik, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Fazalhaq Farooqi, Shahbaz Ahmed, Jaydev Unadkat, Akash Singh, Jhathavedh Subramanyan.

Time: 7.30PM IST.

With PTI inputs