Kolkata Knight Riders managed to reach last year’s play-offs with the smallest squad and also by surviving a few injury scares to the players who were part of the squad. This year as well, KKR have already lost 3 of their fastest bowlers, the Indian duo of Nagarkoti and Mavi, and the South African Nortje.
Prior to the auctions this year, Kolkata Knight Riders released all their international players, barring Lynn, Narine and Russell, who are the default picks in their starting XI.
In the auctions, KKR added two quality all-rounders, Denly and Brathwaite, to their squad. In addition to this, KKR also got two express pace bowlers in Ferguson and Nortje and an extremely clever T20 bowler in Harry Gurney. The Indian buys are purely replacement buys in case of any injuries to their first team players.
Team after 2019 Player Auction
In:- Joe Denly, Nikhil Naik, S Mundhe, Carlos Brathwaite, Prithviraj Yarra, Harry Gurney, Anrich Nortje(out for season), Lockie Ferguson, Sandeep Warrier and KC Cariappa(replacements for Nagarkoti ans Mavi respectively)
Out:- Mitchell Starc, Mitchell Johnson, Tom Curran, Cameron Delport, Javon Searles, Ishank Jaggi, Apoorv Wankhede, Vinay Kumar
Kolkata Knight Riders – 2019 Squad
Strengths
There is no other combination as fearsome as Lynn-Narine. When on song, they can take the match away from the opposition even before the powerplay ends. KKR will be hoping that they again come good together and give them the impetus at the start of the innings.
Chawla and Kuldeep in the middle overs. Kolkata Knight Riders are the only side that play two very attacking leg-spinners in their starting line-up. They bowl attacking lines and make it difficult for scoring and this leads to the batsman committing mistakes under pressure thereby losing their wickets. KKR would want both of them to be at their absolute best throughout the tournament.
Weakness
Although they have a quality starting XI, an injury to a key member of the squad can disturb their plans big time. This is because, they hardly have quality replacements in their squad. Barring an international bowler and an all-rounder, there are none in their squad who can easily be drafted into the XI.
Lack of bowling resources is another problem for KKR. Having already lost 3 of their fast bowlers, Kolkata Knight Riders would be keeping their fingers crossed to keep the others in the squad fit till the end of the tournament. An injury to one of the international fast bowlers at some point can pretty much hamper their season until and unless they get someone else to rise to the occasion.
Predicted Starting XI
Chris Lynn
Sunil Narine
Robin Uthappa
Nitish Rana
Dinesh Karthik
Shubman Gill
Andre Russell
Piyush Chawla
Kuldeep Yadav
Lockie Ferguson/ Harry Gurney
Prasidh Krishna
Kolkata Knight Riders – IPL Schedule
Although KKR managed to reach the play-offs last time around with pretty much the same squad as they have now, this time around they do not look like going past the league stage.
Expected position in the league table: Bottom half