The table-toppers Kolkata Knight Riders will lock horns against Sunrisers Hyderabad in the first qualifier at the Narendra Modi Stadium, Ahmedabad on Tuesday. KKR suffered only three losses in the league stage and there is no doubt that they have been the best team in the tournament so far.
On the other hand, Sunrisers Hyderabad have sent shivers down the opposition’s spine as they have adopted an aggressive batting approach, which has worked wonders for them.
KKR have also followed the same template with their top order doing the bulk of the damage. However, KKR will be without the services of Phil Salt, who played an instrumental role along with Sunil Narine. Salt will be replaced by Rahmanullah Gurbaz in the final XI and the Afghanistan wicket-keeper will look to grab his chance at this crucial stage of the tournament.
KKR’s other strength has been their spinners – Sunil Narine and Varun Chakravarthy. The duo has collectively picked 33 wickets in 12 matches and has played a key role in the middle overs.
Meanwhile, SRH has been beautifully led by Pat Cummins, who has got the best out of his players. The Australian has given all the freedom to his players and he has played a key role in the success of the team.
Match Prediction: Kolkata Knight Riders will enter the contest as favorites against Sunrisers Hyderabad.
SRH IPL 2024 FULL SQUAD
Abdul Samad, Abhishek Sharma, Aiden Markram, Marco Jansen, Rahul Tripathi, Washington Sundar, Glenn Phillips, Sanvir Singh, Heinrich Klaasen, Bhuvneshwar Kumar, Mayank Agarwal, T. Natarajan, Anmolpreet Singh, Mayank Markande, Upendra Singh Yadav, Umran Malik, Nitish Kumar Reddy, Fazalhaq Farooqi, Shahbaz Ahmed, Travis Head, Wanindu Hasaranga, Pat Cummins ©, Jaydev Unadkat, Akash Singh, Jhathavedh Subramanyan.
KKR Squad: Shreyas Iyer, Phil Salt, K.S. Bharat, Rahmanullah Gurbaz (AFG), Rinku Singh, Angkrish Raghuvanshi, Sherfane Rutherford (WI), Manish Pandey, Andre Russell (WI), Nitish Rana, Venkatesh Iyer, Anukul Roy, Ramandeep Singh, Varun Chakravarthy, Sunil Narine (WI), Vaibhav Arora, Chetan Sakariya, Harshit Rana, Suyash Sharma, Mitchell Starc (AUS), Dushmantha Chameera (SL), Sakib Hussain, Mujeeb Ur Rahman (AFG).
