High on confidence after four back-to-back victories, the Kolkata Knight Riders seemed ready to take on the challenges from their rivals in the remaining league games as the race to the playoffs enters its final phase. But now the challenge has come from within the team and they need to overcome that before they can plot the rivals’ downfall.
The Knights take on Royal Challengers Bengaluru in Raipur on Wednesday. The defending champions, after a mini-wobble following losses to Gujarat Titans and Lucknow Super Giants, breathed easy after winning a nail-biter against Mumbai Indians in their previous game. But even then, the Knights, with confidence and momentum on their side, would have had an upper hand over RCB.
But just when things were beginning to fall into place for the Knights, they are having to sweat over the fitness of Varun Chakravarthy, one of the main forces behind their turnaround this season.
The Knights are monitoring the condition of Varun, who aggravated the pain in his left leg after getting hurt during the Sunrisers Hyderabad clash in Hyderabad, and was seen walking wearing a protective boot in a social media footage. Even in KKR’s eight-wicket away win over Delhi Capitals last Friday, Varun had bowled his four overs through pain.
“Varun is still being monitored at present,” assistant coach Shane Watson said on Tuesday, the eve of the clash against RCB. “Obviously, he has been sore.
“In the last two games, he was in a lot of pain. He still bowled incredibly well.
We’re just monitoring him. We’ve got our fingers crossed that he’ll be available for tomorrow (Wednesday), but we’re still not exactly sure,” Watson added.
If Varun isn’t fit for the clash, the Knights could face a tricky call on finalising his replacement. Maharashtra and former Chennai Super Kings leg-spinner Prashant Solanki or young Daksh Kamra, who’s a little more like Varun as he relies more on the googly, could be the like-for-like replacement.
The temperature in Raipur on Wednesday evening is expected to fall to around 28°C from 40°C during the daytime. Like it was during the RCB-Mumbai game, the quicks too may again get a little more purchase than the spinners then. The Knight Riders, thus, need to be diligent if Varun doesn’t recover in time. Also, they will have to ensure that Sunil Narine, the other key spinner, is not under any extra pressure.
On the batting front, KKR would like Finn Allen to continue with his big-hitting prowess against Bhuvneshwar Kumar and Josh Hazlewood in the Powerplay.