Match facts
Delhi Daredevils v Kolkata Knight Riders
Monday, April 17, 2017
Start time 1600 local
03:08
Agarkar: Delhi should bat Pant higher than Nair
Head to head
Last season Daredevils beat Knight Riders at home by 27 runs but were walloped in their away match, collapsing to 98 in a nine-wicket defeat.
Overall record Knight Riders have won 10 out of the 17 matches between the two sides. At Feroz Shah Kotla, Daredevils’ home ground, Knight Riders have won four out of six matches.
In the news
Given the possibility of facing a pitch similar to Daredevils’ game against Kings XI Punjab on Saturday, which played slow, there could be a case for Knight Riders making a switch, with Shakib Al Hasan coming in for Chris Woakes or Colin de Grandhomme. This could bolster their already formidable spin attack and lengthen their batting a bit against one of the most economical bowling attacks in the end overs. Daredevils, this season, have an economy rate of 6.44 in the last five overs, the lowest for all teams. Woakes has taken wickets for Knight Riders but has had an economy rate of under 10 in only one out of four matches.
Likely XIs
Delhi Daredevils: 1 Sanju Samson, 2 Sam Billings, 3 Shreyas Iyer, 4 Karun Nair, 5 Rishabh Pant (wk), 6 Corey Anderson, 7 Chris Morris, 8 Pat Cummins, 9 Amit Mishra, 10 Zaheer Khan (capt), 11 Shahbaz Nadeem
Kolkata Knight Riders: 1 Sunil Narine, 2 Gautam Gambhir (capt), 3 Robin Uthappa (wk), 4 Manish Pandey, 5 Yusuf Pathan, 6 Suryakumar Yadav, 7 Colin de Grandhomme/Rovman Powell, 8 Chris Woakes/Shakib Al Hasan, 9 Kuldeep Yadav 10 Umesh Yadav, 11 Trent Boult
Strategy punt
Zaheer Khan and Chris Morris have enjoyed success against Knight Riders batsmen Gautam Gambhir and Robin Uthappa. Zaheer and Morris have both dismissed Uthappa twice and he has an average of 20.5 and 13 respectively. Gambhir has an average of 20.2 against Zaheer and has been dismissed five times by the bowler.
Key stats
- Knight Riders batsmen have scored a total of 224 runs in the Powerplay at a run rate of 9.20. Of these, Gambhir has scored 105 runs off 68 balls. His current strike rate of 154 is already his second best in Powerplays in IPL, after the 2012 IPL.
- Amit Mishra has 50 wickets at Feroz Shah Kotla. Harbhajan Singh and Lasith Malinga – at Wankhede Stadium – are the only other bowlers who have taken more than 50 wickets at one venue.
- It isn’t just Morris and Zaheer Khan that Uthappa is vulnerable against. Amit Mishra has dismissed him four times in 10 innings in the IPL.
- Daredevils’ top four that played in their match against Kings XI Punjab – Sanju Samson, Sam Billings, Shreyas Iyer, Karun Nair – have only 294 T20 innings between them and an aggregate of 6147 runs at an average of 26.49 and 36 fifties and a century. They are, by far, the least-experienced top four in this IPL.
Rachna Shetty is a senior sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
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Source: ESPN Crickinfo