IPL 2018: New-look KKR aim to start afresh post Gautam Gambhir era

Gautam GambhirA newlook Kolkata Knight Riders KKR sans their most successful captain Gautam Gambhir will look to outshine a strong Royal Challengers Bangalore RCB led by Virat Kohli in the inaugural match of this seasons Indian Premier League IPL at the Eden Gardens here on Sunday Gambhir who led KKR to IPL titles in 2012 and 2014 left the citybased franchise to join his home team Delhi Daredevils prompting the KKR management to appoint seasoned campaigner Dinesh Karthik as skipper for the 11th editionKarthik riding high after an unbeaten eightball 29 where he clobbered a lastball six to singlehandedly guide India to a fourwicket victory over Bangladesh in the final of the Nidahas Trophy T20I Triseries in Sri Lanka will have his task cut out Im aware of the expectations Whether there would be pressure yes As a captain youre expected to at least go to the playoffs thats the least anybody can expect Karthik had said in his first interaction with journalists as KKR captain It will be a litmus test first up for Karthik and his charges against RCB who once again look very strong on paper Kohli and Co finished at the bottom of the pile last time and since the start of the IPL have come close to laying their hands on the elusive trophy thrice in 2009 2011 and 2016 But once again the Bangalorebased outfit have put together an impressive squad The batting department in particular looks to be one of the best in the leagueLed by the mercurial Kohli RCB boast of proven IPL stars like AB De Villiers Brendon McCullum Corey Anderson and Quinton De Kock RCB have always been weak when it comes to their bowling unit This time though with the likes of Yuzvendra Chahal Umesh Yadav Washington Sundar and Tim Southee they have looked to plug the gap We are optimistic about the season Its very very balanced side In the 10 years that Ive been here I dont think weve ever had such a balance We had initially but everyone firing together is also a massive factor Kohli had said few days ago about his teamAs for the hosts KKR will miss the services of Australian pace spearhead Mitchell Starc who has been ruled out with injured right shin Fellow Aussie Mitchell Johnson will look to fill the void as will England allrounder Tom Curran who has been roped in as Starcs replacement The purple brigade will once again pin their hopes of destructive batsman Chris Lynn to deliver the goods at the top of the order In the seven matches Lynn played last season the 27year old scored 295 runs at a strike rate of 18098 Besides Lynn vicecaptain Robin Uthappa who has been ever so consistent for KKR will also have a lot of expectations riding on him like captain Karthik KKR unlike RCB have always been strong in the bowling department and this time also have wrist spinners Kuldeep Yadav and Piyush Chawla and the evereffective Sunil Narine to bank on In the pace department Johnson will be assisted by R Vinay Kumar U19 World Cup winner Kamlesh Nagarkoti and allrounder Andre RussellThe trio of Lynn Russell and Narine who are their obvious choice as foreigners are coming back from respective setbacks Lynn shoulder and Russell hamstring are recovering from injuries while Narine remodelled his action after his latest pullup KKR also have Player of the U19 World Cup Shubman Gill and pacer Shivam Mavi in their ranks besides Nagarkoti It will be also be interesting see how two of Indias celebrated wristspinners Chahal and Kuldeep pit their wits against each otherA wellrested Kohli who is the only player to have represented the same franchise for 11 years will also get help from Indias 2011 World Cup winning duo of Gary Kirsten and Ashish Nehra as batting and bowling coaches respectively in addition to retaining Daniel Vettori as their head coach KKR have kept faith in legendary South African allrounder Jacques Kallis who is the head coach along with Aussie Simon Katich as batting coach only roping in Zimbabwean Heath Streak to replace Laxmipathy Balaji as bowling coach KKR go into the match with happy memories of bundling out RCB for the lowest ever IPL total 49 here last year while in the return leg Narine smashed the tournaments fastest fifty 17 ball 54 as they made a double over Kohlis side in 2017 KKR lead the head to head count by an impressive 129 record across 10 seasonsCatch up on all the latest IPL news and updates here Also download the new midday Android and iOS apps to get latest updatesThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever