IPL 2024 AUCTIONS - KOLKATA KNIGHT RIDERS

 

Welcome to another episode in the series of blogs where we revisit the IPL 2024 auctions. This time, we will be analyzing Kolkata Knight Riders and look at their squad, predicted playing XI and their strengths and weaknesses.

Kolkata Knight Riders(KKR)

KKR has won the IPL trophy twice under the leadership of Gautam Gambhir in 2012 and 2014. But post Gambhir leaving KKR, their journey haven't been too fruitful in IPL. They did manage to reach the finals in 2021 but apart from that, they have had disappointing seasons in past few years. They are a high brand value franchise backed by two of the greatest Bollywood stars, Shahrukh Khan and Juhi Chawla and therefore have a huge fan base. Their fans would want the team to return on track and reach their full glory the way it was under Gautam Gambhir's captaincy.

   

IPL 2023 PERFORMANCE

KKR did not have the best of seasons in 2023 as they finished 7th on the points table with 12 points. The inconsistency of the players throughout the season was one of their main concerns last year. But the brightest light for them even in an under-par season was Rinku Singh who had a brilliant season with the bat, and the highlight was him hitting 5 sixes of last 5 balls against GT to get them to victory. His heroics in IPL also earned him national call ups where also he performed very well. Other positives for them will be return of their skipper Shreyas Iyer and performance of young leg spinner Suyash Sharma. KKR would be hoping for these to continue their heroics, while hoping for all the other players to step up this season and give a better performance

IPL 2024 AUCTIONS

KKR, unlike other teams, wasn't involved in any trade deals before the auctions. However, they did let go of 12 of their players and set out to make quite a new look team in this years auction. They let go of the most of their fast bowlers and their overseas players including the likes of Lockie Ferguson, Tim Southee, Shakib Al Hasan among others. They did retain their core batting line up but they would hope their batsman to fire this season. The highlight for them in the auction was the buy of Mitchell Starc for a whopping 24.75cr, the highest ever bid in the history of IPL. They would be hoping for his availability for the full season keeping in mind that t20 world cup is scheduled to start very soon after the IPL.

Released Players: Shakib Al Hasan, Litton Das, Aarya Desai, David Wiese, Shardul Thakur, Narayan Jagadeesan, Mandeep Singh, Kulwant Khejroliya, Lockie Ferguson, Umesh Yadav, Tim Southee, Johnson Charles

Full Squad:  Nitish Rana, Rinku Singh, Rahmanullah Gurbaz, Shreyas Iyer, Jason Roy, Sunil Narine, Suyash Sharma, Anukul Roy, Andre Russell, Venkatesh Iyer, Harshit Rana, Vaibhav Arora, Varun Chakaravarthy, KS Bharat , Chetan Sakariya , Mitchell Starc , Angkrish Raghuvanshi , Ramandeep Singh , Sherfane Rutherford, Manish Pandey, Mujeeb Ur Rahman, Gus Atkinson, Sakib Hussain

Strongest Playing XI: Rahmanullah Gurbaz(wk), Venkatesh Iyer, Shreyas Iyer(c), Nitish Rana, Rinku Singh, Andre Russell, Sunil Narine, Mitchell Starc, Varun Chakravarthy, Suyash Sharma, Chetan Sakariya

The playing XI of KKR looks good on paper but consistency of their top order would be a key for them. They would want consistent performances from the likes of Gurbaz, Venkatesh Iyer and Nitish Rana who have often given blow hot blow cold kind of performances. Their top order would be strengthened by return of their skipper Shreyas Iyer this season. They would want Rinku Singh to keep firing like last year. They would want Andre Russell to fire all guns blazing, as his form in last couple of years has been an area of concern for KKR. Their strength has always been their spin bowling department, which should be the case this year as well with Sunil Narine, Varun Chakravarthy and Suyash Sharma in the team. Bulk of the workload in fast bowling department would be done by Mitchell Starc, but he would need a good helping hand from Chetan Sakariya and Andre Russell. Overall, the side is good and definitely can beat any team on a good day.

Areas Of Concern

• The form of Andre Russell is key to providing KKR the balance they need in their XI and if he is out of form again this season, it can be a big headache for them.
• With the decline in the batting form of Sunil Narine over past few years, the depth in their batting lineup becomes a concern, they would be playing with 6 batsman only. They might think of sending in Mitchell Starc at 7 if Narine doesn't fire, but the overall depth in batting still doesn't look promising.
• Fast bowling department might be a concern for them as the bulk of the workload would have to be handled by Mitchell Starc, since Andre Russell hasn't always been bowling fit in past few editions of IPL, and they don't seem to have same class in fast bowling department apart from Starc. Chetan Sakariya will have to step up to the aid of Starc if they want to give this attack a lethal look.
• The inconsistency of the top order was a major concern for them last year as well, and they would like to change that. They would need their top order to provide them with good starts on consistent basis so that players like Rinku Singh and Andre Russell can take advantage of it.

Let me know your thoughts on this squad and playing XI in the comments below.