04:35
Agarkar: KKR have enough opening options
Toss Kolkata Knight Riders chose to bowl v Royal Challengers Bangalore
Live scorecard and ball-by-ball details
Dinesh Karthik, the new Kolkata Knight Riders captain, opted to bowl in their first match against Virat Kohli’s Royal Challengers Bangalore. Royal Challengers chose Brendon McCullum, Quinton de Kock, AB de Villiers and Chris Woakes as their overseas players, while Knight Riders gave Mitchell Johnson the nod ahead of Tom Curran. As expected, Sunil Narine, Chris Lynn and Andre Russell were the other three overseas picks for Knight Riders.
The hosts also kept their India Under-19 stars on the bench. They handed an IPL debut to Rinku Singh, who was given his cap by Jacques Kallis, and picked Vinay Kumar ahead of Kamlesh Nagarkoti and Shivam Mavi. Royal Challengers went with left-arm quick Kulwant Khejroliya ahead of his Delhi team-mate Navdeep Saini as their other Indian pace option apart from Umesh Yadav.
Like last year – when every team chose to bowl at Eden Gardens – Kohli also admitted his decision would have been to chase. The match will also be Kohli and Robin Uthappa’s 150th match in the IPL.
Kolkata Knight Riders: 1 Chris Lynn, 2 Sunil Narine, 3 Robin Uthappa (wk), 4 Nitish Rana, 5 Dinesh Karthik (capt), 6 Rinku Singh, 7 Andre Russell, 8 Piyush Chawla, 9 Kuldeep Yadav, 10 Mitchell Johnson, 11 Vinay Kumar
Delhi Daredevils: 1 Brendon McCullum, 2 Quinton de Kock (wk), 3 Virat Kohli (capt), 4 AB de Villiers, 5 Sarfaraz Khan, 6 Mandeep Singh, 7 Chris Woakes, 8 Washington Sundar, 9 Umesh Yadav, 10 Yuzvendra Chahal, 11 Kulwant Khejroliya
Sreshth Shah is a sub-editor at ESPNcricinfo
© ESPN Sports Media Ltd.
Source: ESPN Crickinfo