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Outmuscled in their previous matches, title-holders Kolkata Knight Riders and Rajasthan Royals will eye a quick course correction in every aspect when they face each other in an IPL match here on Wednesday.
The Knight Riders were beaten by seven wickets by Royal Challengers Bengaluru in the tournament-opener while the Royals were given a 44-run drubbing by Sunrisers Hyderabad.
The common theme in those defeats was how the seemingly powerful batting and bowling units of KKR and RR failed to fire.
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While the Rajasthan outfit might offer the excuse of playing on a Hyderabad shirtfront for the malfunction of their bowling unit, the Kolkata side do not have any such cover. Apart from Sunil Narine, none of the KKR bowlers were able to contain free-flowing RCB batters, and in that the demystification of mystery spinner Varun Chakravarthy might just worry them a bit.
Even on an Eden Gardens pitch that had some grip, Chakravarthy was given a towelling by Phil Salt and Virat Kohli. The KKR camp now hopes that Chakravarthy will find his stride on a Guwahati pitch that generally has some bite.
Similarly, KKR’s middle-order batting crumbled spectacularly after skipper Ajinkya Rahane and Narine gave them a blistering start, eventually settling for a sub-par score.
Their batting pivots such as Venkatesh Iyer and Andre Russell got out, playing pre-determined cross-batted shots, and KKR will hope that they will show more game awareness in Guwahati.
It will also be a blot on stand-in skipper Riyan Parag who, at times, looked perplexed on the field about the decisions to be made.
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