After pulling off an incredible heist against the defending champions at their homeground, the Knights return home to host Sunrisers Hyderabad at the Eden Gardens on Friday. The Knights enjoy a great record against the Sunrisers, winning 15 of the 23 matches the sides have played against each other and will look to add another ‘W ‘when the two teams step onto the ground tomorrow.
Buoyed by two back to back wins which saw heroics from the likes of Shardul Thakur, Rinku Singh, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Varun Chakravarthy, Venkatesh Iyer and Skipper Rana, the Knights think tank will be proud of how the season has started after suffering from major injury setbacks in pre-season.
There is also good news from camp is that both English opener Jason Roy and Litton Das are now available for selection. This gives Coach Chandrakant Pandit and co. a privileged selection headache to deal with going into the game. Lockie Ferguson played his first game of the season against the Titans and the Knights will be hoping the Kiwi pacer keeps bowling 150+ consistently. The game against Royal Challengers earlier this month is an indicator,that we can expect the conditions to favour the batters once again. However, with the heat peaking in Kolkata, a dry surface at the Eden could aid the spinners as well. Spin twins Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy and youngster Suyash Sharma could once again have key roles to play on Friday night!
The Sunrisers started the season with two back to back losses at the hands of Rajasthan Royals and Lucknow Super Giants. However, they bounced back on Sunday beating the Punjab Kings in convincing fashion to get their season off the mark and will come into the game in Eden with confidence. The last time the Knights went toe to toe with the Sunrisers, an all-round show from Russell powered us to a win over our opposition by 54 runs. Russell top scored with the bat scoring 49* of 28 balls and then grabbed 3 wickets for 22 runs, helping us defend 178 in Pune.
Come Friday, the Knights will go out there to continue their recent run of form and good fortunes over the Deccan based side in the IPL. Another enthralling contest calls us to the Eden!
