Rinku Singh cricket: Why is Faf du Plessis not playing today’s IPL 2020 match vs KKR?

Rinku Singh: Kolkata Knight Riders have included batsman Rinku Singh for the first time in Indian Premier League 2020.

During the 49th match of the ongoing 13th season of the Indian Premier League between Kolkata Knight Riders and Chennai Super Kings in Dubai, Chennai Super Kings captain Mahendra Singh Dhoni has won the toss and opted to field.

“We are bowling first, bit worried about the dew. We had some dew during practice, so it’s better to bat second with dew around. We haven’t been at our best, that’s the reason we have been lagging behind,” Dhoni told Star Sports during the toss.

Being asked about the changes in their Playing XI, Dhoni announced three of them as opening batsman Faf du Plessis, pacer Monu Kumar and spinner Imran Tahir have been replaced by opening batsman Shane Watson, spinner Karn Sharma and pacer Lungi Ngidi.

During the toss, Dhoni also said that one of their three benched players has been rested due to an injury but didn’t name him. If not for the injury, Super Kings’ highest run-scorer in du Plessis (401) has been benched in a bid to test the bench strength.

Who is Rinku Singh?

On the other hand, Kolkata Knight Riders captain Eoin Morgan confirmed their solitary change in the form of fast bowler Prasidh Krishna making way for batsman Rinku Singh.

“One change for us – Rinku Singh in, Prasidh Krishna out. Andre Russell is not near fit yet so he misses out today. We can only control what we can do. We have had an up and down season. We are against a good CSK side. Myself and Brendon [McCullum, head coach] are all about freeing people,” Morgan told Star Sports during the toss.

Rinku, 23, represents Uttar Pradesh in domestic cricket and will be playing his first IPL 2020 match at the Dubai International Cricket Stadium tonight. Been with the Knight Riders since IPL 2018, Rinku has scored 66 runs in seven IPL innings at a strike rate of 101.54. In 53 T20s in his six-year career, the southpaw has scored 763 runs at an average and strike rate of 20.62 and 137.97 respectively.